


Something Next to Normal

by heyjupiter, tarajuku



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Awesome Pepper Potts, Everyone Has Issues, Hulk Feels, OT3, Science Bros, Tony Loves His Bots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-03
Updated: 2013-11-03
Packaged: 2017-12-31 07:56:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 28,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1029196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heyjupiter/pseuds/heyjupiter, https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarajuku/pseuds/tarajuku
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Bruce Banner saw the headlines that Tony Stark was dead, he got on the first plane back to LA. Luckily, by the time he landed, Tony was no longer dead, but he did need help making good on his promise to fix Pepper and he figured Bruce would be perfect for the job. What nobody counted on was some of Bruce’s blood accidentally combining with the Extremis in Pepper's system to create something new.</p>
<p>Or, the story of how Bruce Banner learned to stop worrying, Pepper Potts learned to love being an Avenger, and Tony Stark ended up living with two Hulks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Everything's Alright (Yes, Everything's Fine)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Marvel Big Bang 2013 - digital art by [last-winterrose](http://last-winterrose.livejournal.com) [here](http://last-winterrose.livejournal.com/16857.html).
> 
> Endless thanks to our wonderful beta, [likeadeuce](http://archiveofourown.org/users/likeadeuce).

Tony didn’t waste any time after The Thing With Killian. Even though it was Christmas, he left Pepper and Rhodey in Malibu and set up shop in the biggest lab Stark Industries R&D had to offer. With JARVIS on speakerphone he made a list of the things he’d need to work on Extremis, most of which he found while tearing through every drawer, cabinet, and container in the room. Before he had a chance to start, Pepper called to tell him she’d found a place to stay until they figured out a more permanent living situation.

Back in Malibu, Tony found Pepper at an unused Stark Industries property. To his surprise/delight, he also found Bruce there, which was convenient as “lab partner” was one of the things on his list he couldn’t find in the cabinets.

Bruce was looking at Tony like he was back from the dead which was understandable as apparently nobody at SHIELD bothered to keep Bruce updated on the Mandarin situation so when Bruce heard on the news in India or Africa or wherever the fuck he was that Tony Stark was missing and presumed dead he immediately got his ass on the first plane to LAX.

Bruce seemed ready to disappear again, now that he knew Tony was alive and well, but before he had a chance to escape, Tony persuaded him to stay and help him help Pepper. 

“Whatcha doin’?” Tony sing-songed over Bruce’s shoulder. Tony knew exactly what Bruce was doing, Bruce was looking for the cheapest plane ticket to anywhere that didn’t have running water because Bruce wanted to get out of the country as soon as he possibly could. Tony wasn’t about to let him get away that easy. 

“Nothing,” Bruce said, quickly shutting the tablet off. “Just...research.”

“Oh yeah?” Tony asked, throwing his arm around Bruce’s shoulders. “Extremis-related, I assume. Making a lot of progress?”

“Tony, I told you,” Bruce sighed. “I can’t stay long. I have...things, obligations, that I can’t just abandon. The only reason I even came out here is because I thought you were dead.”

“Which I’m not, and isn’t that all the more reason to stay and play mad scientist with me?” Tony squeezed Bruce’s shoulder. “Seriously, though, I need you. At least stick around long enough to help Pepper. You’ve got way more experience with this kind of thing than I do and you know it.”

“Yeah, experience fucking everything up,” Bruce muttered, stepping away and turning his back to Tony.

“She trusts you,” Tony said. “I know she does. And so do I, Bruce, there’s nobody in the world I’d rather work with on this besides you. Try, at least. For Pepper’s sake.”

“Goddammit,” Bruce sighed after a long moment. He turned around and ran his hand back through his hair. 

“Does that mean you’re staying?”

“Just until we figure out how to help Pepper. That’s it.”

“Whatever you say, Dr. Banner,” Tony beamed. He messed up Bruce’s hair, Bruce scowled and smiled, somehow at the same time, and then Tony dragged him by the arm to find Pepper and tell her the good news.

They spent hours every day in the lab (and god it was nice to work with someone as smart as himself, one of the many reasons Tony secretly wanted to keep Bruce forever) reverse-engineering Extremis to isolate the problematic bits. The process made it really easy to figure out all the ways Killian had fucked it up because Killian was an idiot.

Infuriatingly, Tony kept getting interrupted for reasons that usually left him shouting at people on the phone, people like his insurance company who claimed the attack on his house had been “deliberately provoked” which meant they didn’t have to cover it and Nick Fury who was not happy to discover that Tony had blown up all his suits and the team of divers who were slowly recovering debris from the house because _where the fuck were his fucking robots_.

Tony didn’t let any of that bullshit slow him down, though. He almost always worked through the night, long after Bruce went to bed, because his mind was racing with ideas and theories and solutions, about Extremis but also about a thousand other things, and he couldn’t sleep more than an hour or two on the rare nights he even tried.

He wasn’t tired, no, in fact, he was at the top of his game, he and Bruce both were, and when they finished they realized they’d just done months (if not years) of work in three and a half weeks.

The treatments were painful but Pepper barely flinched, telling Tony and Bruce in no uncertain terms that she would sit through as many rounds as it took to get it all out. But not even the combined determination of Pepper, Tony, and Bruce could completely unwind Extremis from her DNA.

“Do we have any idea what’s left? Besides the glowing, obviously.” Pepper crossed her arms self-consciously over her chest, hiding her illuminated hands.

“We don’t know, unfortunately,” Bruce said gently. “My best guess is similar to what you already have, just on a much smaller scale. You won’t have to worry about bursting into flames anymore but you’ll probably still glow a little in response to stress or strong emotions.”

“Oh,” Pepper said quietly. She looked down at her arms, still keeping her hands hidden, and Tony looked helplessly to Bruce.

“Hey, Pepper,” Bruce said with a sad smile. “I’m not going to lie, this sucks. Trust me, I know. But it’s not...you’re tough, Pepper, you’re so much stronger than...than I was. You’re not going to be like me, okay? You’re better than that.”

“Bruce,” Tony started, not in the mood to deal with one of Bruce’s self-hatred spirals, not right now.

“That’s not what I mean. Just that Pepper’s strong and that’ll help her. Honestly, if this had to happen to someone I can't imagine anyone more capable of dealing with it than you.”

She wasn’t thrilled, Tony suspected she even might have cried after they got home, but she was Pepper Potts so she adapted and moved on and was back to being the hot/terrifying CEO in the five-inch heels within days.

They decided to move to New York instead of rebuilding out west. Both Pepper and Tony assumed Bruce would move with them because why wouldn’t he? Bruce had become part of the family, at least as far as Tony was concerned, and Pepper quite possibly adored him even more than Tony did. The three of them fit together so easily, so naturally, that Tony couldn’t imagine moving without Bruce any more than he could imagine moving without Pepper. 

It honestly didn’t occur to either of them to actually ask Bruce what he wanted to do. 

Before they knew it Bruce was gone amidst excuses about not trusting himself to live in the city and overstaying his welcome and needing to get back to his work and Tony knew all of it was bullshit, Bruce was leaving because he was afraid of getting too close to other people, even them. The reason didn’t matter, though, because Bruce packed his duffel bag and gave Tony a hard time about the phone he found wrapped in a pair of his socks (but took it with him anyway) and left for India and all Tony could do was drive him to the airport and watch him go.

The next morning, Pepper made breakfast and it wasn’t until they sat down to eat that they noticed how, out of habit, she’d set the table for three, not two. Tony suddenly wasn’t hungry anymore and apparently Pepper wasn’t, either, because neither of them ate very much during the three minutes of awkward silence that passed before Tony couldn’t stand it anymore. He pushed away from the table, dumped his dish into the sink, and retreated to his lab knowing Bruce’s absence would probably be even more obvious down there.

The extra plate was gone by dinner time and neither of them mentioned it again.

Tony sulked for a week because Bruce was gone and none of Tony’s texts had convinced him to change his mind and come home and they still hadn’t found Dummy and U and he couldn’t find anything to do that kept his attention for any length of time. He wanted to make a suit, his mind was so full of ideas that even JARVIS could barely keep up with his dictation, but he’d promised Pepper, no Iron Man for six months, that was their deal, so he didn’t build a suit, didn’t even design one, just told JARVIS his ideas and left it alone. For Pepper.

He did build Rhodey a new suit, though, because War Machine (still so much more badass than Iron Patriot) wasn’t Iron Man so it was different. Rhodey didn’t seem too appreciative when Tony called him at 3:30 AM, inviting him over for a surprise, but he showed up later that day nonetheless. Rhodey loved the suit and Tony tried not to be jealous when he watched Rhodey take it out for a test drive.

Rhodey hung out all day and it turns out Pepper had called him too (probably at a less obnoxious time of day, though). Apparently she was worried about Tony because he wasn’t doing anything and he was more restless and impulsive than usual and could Rhodey please help him find something to channel his excess energy into. Tony shot down most of Rhodey’s ideas because they were _boring_ , especially after Extremis, until Rhodey, with some hesitation, brought up the shrapnel in Tony’s heart. Tony had tried to fix it, years ago, and it was impossible, not without killing him, and besides, the arc reactor was part of him now, why would he get rid of it, just drop it already Rhodes.

And then Rhodey shrugged and said it was too bad Tony was giving up but if Tony _couldn’t_ figure it out Rhodey was pretty sure nobody could. Tony vaguely recognized that Rhodey was intentionally pushing his buttons but the thought was quickly buried by a landslide of stubborn, defensive defiance and before he knew it Tony was revisiting his heart, partially because he needed something to keep himself busy, but mostly just because he needed to prove Rhodey wrong.


	2. I've Got a Singular Impression Things Are Moving Too Fast

The last few weeks with Tony and Pepper were wonderful. Bruce loved working closely with someone on his intellectual level. He loved having a problem to solve, a problem to lose himself in. He loved Tony's passion and Pepper's kindness.

The last few weeks with Tony and Pepper were terrible. Bruce hated seeing Pepper in pain. He hated being able to help her, but not to cure her. He hated the constant reminders that he was incurable, that the Other Guy was a constant presence in his life.

And that was why Bruce had to leave.

The thing about Tony Stark was that was used to getting what he wanted. He'd started including Bruce in his "we"s and "us"es. He'd made it _very_ clear that Bruce was welcome to stay with them indefinitely. Tony Stark was extremely charismatic and Bruce found it hard not to be flattered to be considered one of Tony's friends.

The thing about Tony Stark was that he thought he was invincible. Bruce would concede that between the power, the privilege, and the high tech armor, Tony Stark was _almost_ invincible.

And that was why Bruce had to leave.

Bruce wasn't invincible either, exactly. But the Other Guy was. The Other Guy ruined lives and families, and it was only a matter of time before either Bruce or the Hulk caused irreparable damage to Tony and Pepper. Tony and Pepper had welcomed Bruce into their home. They'd given him a place to sleep, a lab to work in, and their friendship. They didn't deserve to be punished for that.

So Bruce listened to Tony and Pepper make their plans for the future, plans in New York, and he quietly packed his duffel bag. When he found a Stark phone tucked in with his socks, he knew Tony knew. 

That night at dinner he ran his hands through his hair and said, "Look, I… I have to go."

"Go where?" Pepper asked.

"I don't know… I can't stay here. I should get back to my work. Maybe in India. Maybe another place."

"I'm sorry, but that's bullshit," Tony said. "You'd do more good staying with the Avengers, with us."

"New York is too dangerous for me."

"Last time you were in New York you _saved_ it," Tony protested.

"I really don't think I should press my luck."

"Isn't Kolkata just as stressful as New York?" Pepper asked. "If not more so."

Bruce shook his head. "It's not the crowds, really, it's just…"

"The memories?" Tony said, looking intently at Bruce.

"Yeah. I guess you could say that."

"Well, living at Stark Tower with us would be different," Pepper suggested, but Tony was uncharacteristically quiet. Bruce suspected he'd gotten through to him somehow. He supposed Tony had his own bad memories of New York.

After poking at his plate for a few moments, Tony said, "Well, you'd better keep in touch. I left a phone in your duffel bag. It'll hold a battery for months, and it should get signal just about anywhere, and I'm reasonably sure it's Hulk-proof."

Pepper gave him a sad smile and glowed slightly. She said, " _Promise_ me you'll hang onto it, okay?"

"Okay," Bruce agreed. Pepper cleared her throat and he added, "I promise."

"Good, then," Pepper said.

"It's been… thank you both, for everything."

"Thank _you_ , Bruce. I'm sure Tony wouldn't have been able to fix me half as fast without you."

"Well, we didn't even--" Bruce started.

"She's right," Tony said. "I'm undeniably a genius, but I'm not a medical doctor, for some reason."

"I can think of a few reasons," Bruce said.

"Because I'm far too busy being brilliant in other areas."

"Of course," Bruce and Pepper said in unison. The three of them laughed, and Bruce felt a pang at the thought of leaving this domestic comfort. But he knew it wasn't fair to Tony and Pepper for him to stick around and mess up the good thing they had going. They didn't need a third wheel, especially not a big green one.

So after dinner, he took Pepper up on her offer to book a plane ticket for him. "It would make me feel so much better," she said, and he believed her. He'd asked for the cheapest flight to Kolkata. She'd rolled her eyes a little but had tapped away on her laptop.

"I got you an electronic boarding pass. It should have already been sent to your phone. Your flight leaves tonight at 11pm and you have layovers in London and Mumbai."

"Tonight?"

She shrugged. "You said as soon as possible, and I know your bags are packed already… but I can change it, if you want to stay longer!"

"No… no, thank you."

Pepper glowed and she said, "Take care, Bruce. We'll really miss you."

"I'll miss you too," Bruce said. "It's just better this way."

Pepper's lips tightened, but all she said was, "Tony will drive you to the airport."

"I can just call a cab…."

"Bruce! Do you know how offended Tony would be if you took a cab?"

Bruce sighed. Pepper sighed.

"You geniuses are idiots," she said. "Tony's your friend. He'll take you to the airport. That's what friends do." 

Pepper pulled out out her phone and tapped out a quick message. Tony joined them in the office a few moments later. "The airport? Already?" he asked.

"My flight leaves at 11," Bruce said.

Tony pouted. There was no other word for it. "This is bullshit," he said.

"Maybe you can come visit sometime," Bruce said.

"I swear if you don't respond to my texts within 24 hours, I will," Tony said. "And I'll bring Fury."

"All right, I'll keep in touch," Bruce said.

"Not like last time," Tony said, and Pepper nodded sternly.

"Not like last time," Bruce agreed. The last time he'd left he hadn't said goodbye. He'd just panicked and left and hadn't come back until he'd caught a news report about Tony's death. Tony's "death" had hurt Bruce profoundly. Tony was one of very few people who'd gotten close to Bruce at all, since his accident. It was dangerous and annoying but also true, and he'd hated that no one had thought to call him to let him know Tony was okay. Only later had he realized that maybe they didn't know how to reach him, or had somehow thought that Bruce wouldn't care. Maybe that was what happened if you left in the middle of the night without leaving a forwarding address. Bruce was once again leaving in the middle of the night, but this time he'd take the shiny Stark phone. He'd keep in touch.

Bruce was quiet on the drive to the airport. Tony filled the silence with chatter about how on _earth_ he was going to be able to stay occupied in New York without Bruce to keep him company in the lab, especially since he'd promised Pepper not to make any new Iron Man suits for six months. "Six months, can you believe it?" he asked, shaking his head.

Bruce honestly couldn't believe it and he assumed that Tony had a head full of plans that would be immediately set to prototype the instant six months were up.

Tony dropped Bruce at the gate and said, "Bruce, call if you need anything, okay? I mean it."

"Yeah. Thanks. You too. Call me if you plan to die again, or anything."

Tony laughed. "I don't plan on it any time soon."

The car behind them honked; they were lingering too long in the drop-off only lane. Bruce slung his duffel bag over his shoulder and said, "Well… thanks again."

"See you soon," Tony said, ignoring the other cars.

Bruce gave a half-wave and disappeared inside LAX, knowing it was unlikely that he'd see Tony soon. Inside he showed his ID and fumbled to produce the boarding pass Pepper had sent to his phone.

"Right this way, Mr. Banner," the airline attendant said. "You can wait in our first class lounge until boarding."

"I… oh," Bruce said, fumbling with his duffel. He supposed that was what happened when you let the CEO of Stark Industries book your flight for you. He shuffled off to the first class lounge, which would have seemed insanely luxurious if he'd been coming from anywhere except one of Tony Stark's homes. As it was, he still appreciated the peace and privacy first class offered, though it couldn't quite offset the pang he felt about how much money those tickets must have cost. But the ticket was nonrefundable, and he figured Pepper would have meant for him to enjoy it--or just hadn't thought about it at all--and he resolved to do his best to just be present and enjoy the moment. When they boarded, he had to admit the extra leg room made for a pleasant moment. Which was nice, considering the trip to Kolkata was 38 hours long.

Bruce tried to sleep on the flight. He discovered that Tony had also loaded his phone with a collection of "soothing nature sounds," which made Bruce laugh and feel the opposite of soothed. Bruce brushed up on his Hindi and read the in flight magazine cover to cover. He thought about improvements Tony could make to most of the SkyMall products. He transferred planes like a zombie and somehow he made it to Kolkata. He'd left LA at 11pm on a Thursday and now it was just after 11pm on Saturday. Bruce caught a bus from the terminal toward city center. He got a private room at a hostel he'd used before and decided to figure out a plan tomorrow.

In the morning he had 12 text messages from Tony.

_Did you land yet?_  
 _That flight is crazy long._  
 _I know your flight didn't crash because it would have been on the news by now._  
 _You promised to reply to my texts._  
 _Pepper's getting shawarma, do you want some?_  
 _Just kidding, you can't have any._  
 _Because you left the country._  
 _Pepper said you wouldn't get there until Saturday night._  
 _Have you ever watched Downton Abbey?_  
 _I might start watching Downton Abbey. Happy says it's good._  
 _Pepper ate all your leftover kale chips._  
 _Your plane has definitely landed by now._

Bruce stared at his phone and finally typed, "Landed last night. Sorry, fell asleep & forgot about the phone."

Immediately his phone glowed in response,

_Good I thought maybe you broke up with us already._

Bruce sighed and tucked his phone into his pocket without replying. He knew Tony was joking, but Bruce didn't take friendship lightly. 

Anyway, he had a lot of work to do to restore the life he'd built for himself here. He went back to the clinic where he'd worked. Parama, the clinic coordinator, looked busy as ever but happy to see him. He liked Parama. She didn't take a lot of nonsense, and she'd liked Bruce after he'd stuck around for longer than most American volunteers.

" _Dr. Banner-ji! You never said goodbye!_ " she scolded in Hindi.

Bruce ran a hand through his hair sheepishly. " _There was an emergency back home,_ " he said. " _I had to leave quickly. Sorry._ "

" _Ah, I see,_ " she said, bobbing her head side to side. " _Everything is well, now?_ "

Bruce pursed his lips. " _Yes, everything is well,_ " he decided.

" _Welcome back,_ " she said, and wasted no time in showing him to an exam room. He ate lunch with the rest of the clinic's staff, and Parama told Bruce she'd found a room for him.

" _I'll take you there tonight,_ " she said. " _It's a good room, a widow is renting it out. She'll fatten you up!"_

Bruce thanked her, though he had hoped for a bit more privacy in his lodgings. Well, he could get settled and look for something else on his own time.

His days took on a familiar pattern. He ate breakfast with the widow Chatterjee, her son and daughter-in-law, went to work at the clinic, came home to eat dinner with the Chatterjees, and retired to his room to read novels and scientific journals that he got from the Oxford Bookstore, a fantastic old relic of colonialism and a triumph of cross culturalism. His landlady thought Bruce was very polite, if boring.

Some nights Bruce got requests for housecalls, which he never declined and always half-expected to be another trap from SHIELD.

Every few days he'd get a new text from Tony. Bruce always replied though he never had news.

Bruce felt useful. Bruce felt lonely. Bruce felt sure that he wasn't going to endanger anyone.

Then one day he came home from the clinic and saw Natasha Romanoff chatting with his landlady in fluent Hindi. Bruce breathed in. Bruce breathed out. He said, "Hello, Natasha. What is it this time? Godzilla? The black plague? Time traveling space monsters?"

His landlady raised her eyebrows, and he knew she spoke enough English to be concerned for Bruce's sanity. He also suspected Natasha's presence would take the lead story in all the neighborhood gossip.

"Hmm. Why would the space monsters need to time travel? But no, nothing so interesting as that. I just came to talk."

"Really."

"Really. Walk with me," she said, politely saying goodbye to Mrs. Chatterjee. He followed her to a chai wallah in a nearby square, one who still used disposable clay cups instead of the plastic ones some were switching to. She ordered two chais and said, "How are you doing, Banner?"

"Fine."

Natasha nodded, sizing him up. "What are you doing back here?"

"Working. Helping. What are _you_ doing here?" They took their cups and walked on down the street with them.

"I was in the neighborhood on business and thought I'd drop in. You know, you don't have to run anymore. General Ross is history, and… well, let's just say you're in SHIELD's good graces."

"I know that. It's just… it's just better. For everyone."

Natasha stopped and stared at Bruce for a long moment. "Look, your business is your business, but… you don't have to go through all this alone. If you don't want to."

"Yeah. I do, Natasha."

"I know what it's like to be dangerous. So does Tony. So does Pepper. So do all of us. That's all I'm saying," she said, sipping her chai.

"You should know as well as anyone that I'm not… safe to be around."

"Bullshit, Banner. You need to let grown adults decide if they're willing to take the risk of spending time with you. Which--Tony and Pepper are. Clint and I are. Steve, Thor, Fury--all of them are. These people here, by the way, haven't consciously accepted the risk of living with you." 

Bruce took several seconds to focus on his breathing before he said, "You know I wouldn't hurt any of these people. It's not… it's… I'm in control here."

Natasha nodded once and said, "Well, like I said, it's really none of my business. But I thought you might like to know that Tony's recovering nicely from his heart surgery."

Bruce kept eye contact with Natasha, who almost didn't look afraid. He sighed and said, "Tony had heart surgery?"

"He had the arc reactor removed. Like I said. I thought you should know."

"But he's okay?"

Natasha shrugged. "From what I hear, he's fine. But he cares about you, you know." Bruce let out another sigh. Natasha stared him down, and a small smile played over her lips. "Anyway, I sent a SHIELD travel voucher to your phone. You can use it for a flight home from any airport, any time you decide to give up your bullshit martyr act and visit your friend on his sickbed." She smashed her empty clay cup on the ground and stalked off toward the train station. "See you around, Banner."

Bruce stared into his empty cup and wondered if it would be possible for him to truly go off the grid, even if he wanted to. He dropped his cup and went to pack his duffel bag. He stopped by Parama's house to tell her goodbye, that there had been another emergency at home and he wasn't sure he'd be back.

She'd nodded once, told him to take care of his family first, and wished him well. Then Bruce caught a crowded bus toward the airport and began his journey back to New York.


	3. Everything's Easier When You're Home

Tony never actually meant to go through with the surgery.

He had always intended for the project to stay completely theoretical. He only even kept up with it for the same reasons he did at least half the things he ever did: he was bored and he wanted to prove someone else wrong. So he threw himself into it, working almost as intensely as he had on Extremis, and he didn’t tell Pepper what he was doing (because why would he, he wasn’t actually going to _do_ it) and she didn’t ask, she was just relieved he was keeping himself busy.

He figured it out, of course, and he ran the simulation about a hundred times until he was satisfied with the results. But he still wanted to make sure it was viable, that it could be performed on an actual person, not just as a simulation, so he met with a cardiac surgeon at UCLA, just to discuss it. Theoretically.

Dr. Vogel confirmed that his procedure could be successfully performed with a very high chance of success. Tony ran the numbers while she was talking and determined a success rate of 98.8%. The figure impressed Dr. Vogel but Tony was a perfectionist and 98.8% wasn’t good enough, not with the chance to make up that 1.2% right in front of him.

Tony had stressed the hypothetical nature of their discussion from the start but Dr. Vogel made a list of pros and cons anyway, and her eyebrows shot up when Tony asked to see it but she handed it over without a word. He scribbled “1.2%” on the pro list (which was already much longer than the con list). He skimmed the list over and over, his eyes darting from point to point and refusing to focus on any specific thing. After a minute of skimming, he slammed the list down on the desk, asked Dr. Vogel how soon she could schedule his surgery, and knew without a doubt that he was doing the right thing.

And that was how Tony walked into UCLA to do research and walked out preparing for major heart surgery.

He was halfway home before he remembered he still had to tell Pepper.

He didn’t intentionally avoid telling Pepper, he just didn’t have a chance. She was still at work when he got home and by the time she was back he was up to his elbows - literally - in wiring because he’d decided to tear up some walls so he could try to install JARVIS in the house. He was too distracted to talk when she brought him dinner and lectured him about the mess he was making, and she was fast asleep by the time he finished. He wasn’t home when she left for work because he’d gone to wait for Best Buy to open so he could buy speakers and surveillance cameras to mount around the house for JARVIS, and he was actually asleep when she came home because the first thing JARVIS did after coming online was refuse to respond to anything until Tony took a nap. Pepper was in her office when Tony woke up (sleep time: three hours) but she’d left dinner out and Tony was halfway through his burrito when Pepper stormed into the kitchen and demanded to know why he’d canceled the important shareholder meeting at the end of the week.

To say Pepper wasn’t happy about the short notice would be an understatement, but it didn’t take much to convince her it was a good idea and before long she was smiling and asking questions about the procedure. She went to bed happily a few hours later, leaving Tony so wide awake and buzzing with energy that he paced around the house in circles for 45 minutes before deciding to go visit Happy. He got to Happy’s house but found it completely dark and he realized it was 2:30 AM and he probably shouldn’t wake Happy up because he was still recovering, so he drove to what was left of his house instead and sat at the edge of the water wondering where Dummy and U were until the sun started to rise and then he rushed home hoping Pepper was still asleep and wouldn’t notice he was gone.

Rhodey turned up when they got to the hospital which surprised Tony because he didn’t remember telling Rhodey about the surgery (he even checked his phone just to be sure), but he realized Pepper called him, probably wanting him there for her sake more than Tony’s. He could see them through the window in the OR, Pepper clinging to Rhodey who had his arm protectively around her, and he suddenly remembered how much he missed Bruce. He loved Rhodey, of course, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that their weird little family tableau was incomplete.

The anaesthesia was starting to take effect when Tony realized that, unless Pepper called him too, Bruce didn’t know about the surgery, and Tony’s last conscious thought before he was out completely was hoping Bruce wouldn’t be mad at him.

The surgery took four-and-a-half hours. Tony woke up in a private recovery room about 30 minutes later (which meant he’d been out for five hours and he had no intention of telling anyone that was the longest he’d been able to sleep in weeks, if it even counted as sleep) and was happy to see Pepper and Rhodey at his bedside. Later, he was moved to a different private room until he was discharged two days later. Both Pepper and Rhodey paid more attention to Dr. Vogel’s post-discharge instructions than Tony did, but he figured Pepper could fill him in when they got home, after he found the best place to display the little jar of shrapnel Dr. Vogel gave him.

They moved to New York ten days after Tony’s surgery. Pepper wanted to move before that, she’d even persuaded Dr. Vogel to okay it, but Tony had pitched a fit and refused to move without his robots. They were finally recovered and even though Tony wasn’t supposed to drive yet, Pepper wasn’t home and he couldn’t wait so he drove to Malibu, rescued his poor, battered bots, and, almost as an afterthought, threw the arc reactor into the ocean with the rest of his stuff. Tony smiled as he watched the reactor disappear with a splash because, _finally_ he could really move on with his life now that the last vestige of Afghanistan, and everything that followed, was gone forever.

Well, not _everything_. He’d always be Iron Man, arc reactor or not.

In New York Tony was finally back in his own lab and he was immediately at odds with Dr. Vogel’s post-surgery restrictions because most of them involved “resting frequently” and “taking it easy” and Tony was never any good at either of those things, especially not while he was still running on his post-Extremis, post-surgery buzz. He tried at first, mostly for Pepper’s sake, but he literally couldn’t stand the inactivity and fell back into his old habits as soon as Pepper went back to work.

He devoted all of his time to restoring the robots, which was a huge job because they were both in pretty bad shape. When he finished he had JARVIS run diagnostics which took two absolutely nerve-wracking hours, and finally JARVIS was done, everything appeared normal, and it was time to bring the bots back online.

Tony started with U and held his breath the entire time he booted up, only exhaling when U spun his claw around and chirped excitedly when he found Tony. Dummy was next and most of his problems had been internal and tricky to fix without damaging or possibly even wiping his central processors and circuits, of course, forever the problem child. Dummy took twice as long to boot as U and Tony was shaking the entire time, but finally, finally Dummy came back online and Tony actually sank to his knees in relief and if he cried a little, well, neither of his bots would ever tell.

Tony had the bots help him with the kinds of things he wasn’t supposed to do, mostly heavy lifting. The bots were eager to help and it worked out well for everyone, especially Tony who actually _was_ trying to avoid ripping any of his incisions.

Then, four days after he came back online, Dummy shorted out. Tony flew into a panic and the stress of dragging a powered-down Dummy across the room and then working frantically for six straight hours left him in such bad shape that JARVIS took it upon himself to call Pepper. Tony felt so awful that he didn’t argue when Pepper ordered him upstairs to rest and he found himself actually sleepy after he bundled up on the couch and turned on a _MythBusters_ marathon. He slept through the night (and into the next morning) for the first time in months (without any nightmares, even), finally waking up around 10 AM. Pepper was there and she made him breakfast and helped him shower without getting the incisions wet and let him have his tablet if he promised to stay on the couch and not do any manual labor, and then she went down to her office and Tony was alone.

He asked JARVIS how Dummy was (fine) and if he’d recorded the whole _MythBusters_ marathon (he had) and then he settled in to try and get some work done on his tablet. His body was exhausted but his mind was still racing and he was flipping through files so rapidly he couldn’t even read them and finally he asked JARVIS to find him something to do, something he’d already started and could just pick up where he’d left off.

JARVIS selected the side project Tony had started immediately after the Chitauri attack: custom-designed floors in Stark Tower for each of the Avengers. The idea hadn’t gone anywhere and once he moved back to Malibu he’d mostly forgotten about it. Tony reviewed the plans and decided to work on Bruce’s floor first. His was the closest to completion and besides, just the idea of Bruce moving into Stark Tower made Tony happy even though he knew that probably wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. 

Tony got up and walked around whenever JARVIS told him to and he even remembered to eat lunch at a reasonable hour (he considered 3:15 to be reasonable). Between sips of soup, he finalized Bruce’s floorplan and forwarded the file to Pepper for review. He’d just started putting the finishing touches on Clint’s customized shooting range when Pepper’s voice rang out from the hallway.

“Tony, are you decent?”

“I’m exquisite.”

“I’m serious, Tony. We have company.”

“Company?” Tony asked, putting the soup on the coffee table and standing up. “Good company? Is it Rhodey? You know he's seen--"

“It's not Rhodey but I’d say it’s very good company. Can we come in?” Pepper took Tony’s lack of response as affirmative and opened the door. She beamed at Tony as she walked into the room trailed by a clean-shaven yet perpetually rumpled Bruce Banner.

“Told you it was good company,” Pepper teased when Tony’s face lit up.

“Bruce! Why didn’t you tell me you were coming back? And what’s with the hair, I like you scruffy. You’re staying, right? Bruce, you have to stay this time, I’m making you your own floor!”

“What Tony means is we’ve missed you terribly, Bruce, and you’re welcome to stay as long as you’d like. We’re so glad to have you back.” Pepper smiled and took Bruce’s duffel bag from him. “Are you hungry? Tired? You must be jet-lagged, do you want to take a nap?”

“I’m fine, Pepper,” Bruce laughed. “Actually, um, I could use a shower, if that’s okay. I left kind of suddenly and after being on a plane that long, well, I’ve probably smelled better.”

“You smell fine, Bruce. Better than Tony does, I’m sure.” Pepper said.

“Not cool, Ms. Potts,” Tony protested. He walked over to them, threw his arm around Bruce, grinned, and squeezed Bruce’s shoulder. “No offense, buddy, but Pep’s a liar. You need a shower, like, yesterday.”

“Tony!” Pepper scolded while Bruce laughed. “Bruce, ignore him, he’s been cooped up for too long. Of course you’ll want to freshen up.”

“Also, you don’t need permission to shower in your own home, you know,” Tony added. Bruce flinched when Tony said ‘home,’ but it was slight and if Tony hadn’t been looking for it he might have missed it entirely. 

“Come on, Bruce, let’s get you set up in one of the guest suites for now,” Pepper said, holding him by the wrist and starting toward the door. “All the basics should be there, we can go shopping when you’re settled in. Oh, JARVIS, do you know where those boxes of Bruce’s clothes ended up?”

Tony moved to follow them downstairs but one glare from Pepper (who was arguing with JARVIS about which guest suite Bruce should take) was enough to send him scowling back to the couch. 

He almost couldn’t believe it. Bruce had been on his mind more and more over the past several weeks and now, out of the blue, he was back! Tony was overflowing with things to tell Bruce, ideas and theories to discuss and experiments to run, and he couldn’t wait to show Bruce how much he’d updated the labs - including Bruce’s own, which Tony wasn’t sure Bruce even knew about - since the last time Bruce was in New York.

Tony was about to ask JARVIS to let him know when Bruce got out of the shower when something told him to stop. 

Bruce was back, yes, but Tony had no idea how long Bruce planned on staying. Tony hoped Bruce knew how serious he and Pepper both were about wanting him to stick around indefinitely but, knowing Bruce, he was probably already planning his exit strategy. 

Tony wasn’t going to let Bruce slip away as easily as he had before. Tony needed to make sure Bruce knew he was wanted there, with them, and not let him find any reason to leave.

Living in Stark Tower, Bruce would have access to all the resources and luxuries Tony often took for granted. Bruce could do _his_ work, no restrictions or limitations attached. Bruce would also have a place he could settle into with people who cared deeply about him. Bruce could finally stop running.

Bruce had had all of those things in Malibu, but he still left. He was still afraid of getting too close to other people, a fear Tony had been trying to break him of since the moment they met. 

Maybe that was the problem. Tony had always believed he was helping Bruce by constantly pushing his boundaries and poking at his defenses, but maybe he wasn’t helping at all. 

Maybe Bruce left because Tony pushed him too far and chased him away. Maybe the key to Bruce staying was for Tony to back off once in awhile and try not to be such a dick.

Tony wasn’t sure he could actually do that, but if it would stop Bruce from wanting to leave again, he knew he had to try.


	4. Why Does it Take an Accident (Before the Truth Gets Through to Us)

"I don't understand what Happy sees in this show, it's so boring," Tony said. "With all the clothes, and the... and the..."

Bruce glanced sideways and saw that _Downton Abbey_ had bored Tony so much he'd actually fallen asleep mid-sentence. Bruce was relieved. Tony slept little during the best of times, and frantically working to cure Pepper of Extremis definitely did not qualify as the best of times. That still didn't stop Tony from gloating about how much cleverer he was than Aldrich Killian--which, of course, he was.

Working with Tony on Extremis (on anti-Extremis, that is) had been exhilarating. Bruce hadn't ever worked so hard on anything. Grad school had come close, and the near-mania he'd felt when he was developing the super soldier serum, but never before had the stakes been so high. If he let it, working with Tony would remind him of the pleasure of working with Betty.

If he let it.

Bruce let out a small sigh and watched Tony sleep. It was strange not to see Tony's chest glowing under his T-shirt. That was the other reason Tony needed rest. He was recovering from experimental open heart surgery.

Bruce was thinking too many dangerous thoughts. It wasn't safe for him to get too attached to anyone. Or rather, Bruce wasn't safe for the objects of his attachment. He already made a wreck of Betty Ross's life. He shouldn't do the same to Tony's or Pepper's.

He quietly crept out of the room. In the hallway, he mumbled, "JARVIS, will you please let me know when Tony wakes up?"

"Certainly, Dr. Banner," JARVIS replied.

"Thanks." Bruce had learned it was pointless to try to convince JARVIS to be more informal with him. Only Tony could, and Tony repeatedly declined to do so.

Bruce continued down the hall to the kitchen, which was mysteriously well-stocked with Bruce's favorite foods. (Okay, so it wasn't a very difficult mystery to solve. He knew JARVIS ordered groceries and household supplies according to an algorithm that accounted for guests. Tony was very proud of it.)

The abundance of food felt luxurious, along with the state-of-the-art kitchen gadgets. Compared to some of the places Bruce had lived over the last few years, just having reliable electricity was luxurious enough.

Before the accident, Bruce had never been much of a cook. He'd lived on pizza and Pop-Tarts and whatever free food could be scavenged from campus events. He hadn't had the time to cook, and he hadn't really cared about what he ate.

Since he'd gone on the run, though, that had changed. For one thing, he tended to have plenty of free time. For another, he found himself caring slightly more about what he ate. As part of his pledge to not hurt anyone, he'd decided to become vegetarian, which could be a tricky prospect in some of the countries where he'd lived (though not India, which was one of the reasons he'd liked it there). Too, there were foods he missed. It turned out most of the world was not very good at making pizza, for example, and one could either pay exorbitant prices at a Pizza Hut in one of the major cities, eat bad pizza, or learn that making it from scratch wasn't that hard. If Bruce could make decent pizza in a Dutch oven with questionable cheese, he could probably make something remarkable here in a Stark Tower kitchen. But making pizza from scratch seemed pointless in New York, so instead, Bruce started chopping vegetables to make a green curry.

That was another thing he liked about cooking: it usually involved mindlessly repetitive labor, which he found meditative.

He heard Pepper's voice behind him say, "You know, there's a food processor in one of the cupboards."

Bruce turned and smiled. "I figured. But I kinda like doing it the old-fashioned way."

"Suit yourself. Whatcha making?"

"Curry," Bruce said, turning back to the cutting board. He'd laid out all of his ingredients on the counter.

"Yum!" Pepper stood beside him and examined the can of coconut milk. Bruce hadn't counted on company while he cooked, and he felt oddly nervous. He focused carefully on the sharp chef's knife. He relaxed a little when he heard Pepper sit down at the kitchen table behind him. "JARVIS said Tony's asleep. What's your secret?" she asked.

" _Downton Abbey_."

Pepper laughed. "Oh, no! He wasn't enthralled by Mary and Matthew's courtship?" she asked, in a mock-offended tone.

"He didn't even stay awake long enough to meet Matthew," Bruce said.

"I'll have to keep that in mind for future reference. I was going to put something in his drink if he didn't get some sleep soon."

"Maybe not the _best_ idea."

"Maybe not," Pepper allowed. "But not the _worst_ idea."

"Oh, no, the list of worst ideas is very long. It doesn't have room for some tiny little thing like roofieing Tony Stark."

For a long moment the only sound in the kitchen was the solid thunk of Bruce's knife hitting the cutting board. Then he heard Pepper take a shaky breath and ask, "Bruce? What... what does it feel like when you Hulk out?"

Another silence, now uncomfortable, hung in the air. Pepper said, "Never mind," just as Bruce said, "Well..."

They both laughed, and Bruce said, "It's okay. It's just... I don't know how to explain it. I don't really remember most of what happens when I... when the Other Guy comes out. Um." Bruce was out of vegetables to chop, which was terrible. But there was still the tofu, which was pressing. Bruce transferred it to the cutting board and began to chop when Pepper blurted out, "I miss Extremis."

Bruce was so surprised that his hand slipped for a second and he sliced his finger. He sucked in a breath and shook his hand, once, then wrapped a dish towel around it. He focused his breathing.

"Oh no," Pepper said, and Bruce heard her chair scrape back from the table.

"No, don't--" Bruce said. "I mean, I'm fine. I just slipped. I--it wasn't--"

But Pepper was behind him, peering at his hand. "That's a lot of blood. Do you think you need stitches?"

"Pepper, my blood is _dangerous_ ," Bruce said through gritted teeth.

"I know all about dangerous," Pepper said. "And I'm not afraid of you, Bruce."

"No, this isn't about... my blood literally causes gamma poisoning. Can you please bring me a first aid kit? And get gloves, for yourself?"

"All right," Pepper said. She left the kitchen, heels clacking, and Bruce held a towel over his finger and felt like an idiot. Here he was, a guest in Tony Stark's home, and he was spraying an extreme biohazard all over the place. At least he felt confident that Pepper would listen to him. Tony was more likely to lick his blood just to see what would happen.

Bruce breathed in, and breathed out, and heard Pepper click back into the room.

"Here," she said, handing him the kit. "Are you sure you don't need stitches?"

"Pepper, I _told_ you to put gloves on," Bruce said, meticulously cleaning up the blood and bandaging his finger. He didn't think it would need stitches, but it was worse than it had originally looked. Tony Stark's kitchen had very sharp knives.

"There weren't any in that kit, and I thought I should bring it before you _bled to death_ ," Pepper said.

Bruce exhaled. "Well... thank you, but I'm not in danger of that. You, on the other hand, are in danger of gamma poisoning. In case you forgot."

Pepper said, "I've been through worse than gamma poisoning. In case _you_ forgot."

Bruce inhaled and shook his head. "That sounds like something Tony would say."

"Oh God, it kinda does, doesn't it?" Pepper said, covering her mouth with her hand. "Ah!"

"What? Pepper, you didn't--"

Pepper pressed her hand to her mouth and pulled it away. "I must have just nicked my lip with my nail or something. It stung for a second but now it's nothing." She smiled. "See?"

Bruce exhaled. "Okay, but I'm serious, please let me take care of this. I'd feel--I'd feel awful if you got sick because of me."

"All right," Pepper conceded, her tone a bit softer than before.

Bruce cleaned up, bleached everywhere, and decided to take everything that had possibly been contaminated to the lab to be incinerated. The last step might have been overkill, but better safe than sorry.

On his walk back to the kitchen, JARVIS announced, "Dr. Banner, you asked me to notify you when Master Stark awoke?"

"Yeah. Oh, already?" Bruce asked.

"Yes. My biometric data show that he slept for 44 minutes and completed 1 REM cycle."

"Well... better than nothing, I guess."

"Are you guys talking about me?" Tony asked, striding down the hall toward Bruce. "You totally are. Can't a guy keep his own biometric data confidential?"

"Master Stark, you instructed me to provide Dr. Banner with all the resources he required for his scientific pursuits."

"Hmm. Am I a scientific pursuit?" Tony asked.

"Something like that," Bruce agreed.

"Well, I expect full editorial privileges before you attempt to publish anything, you hear me?"

"Oh, I think I'm still years away from having anything publishable."

"You do have very complicated subject matter."

"And a lot of conflicting data," Bruce agreed. "Are you hungry? I was cooking..."

Tony raised an eyebrow. "In the lab?"

"No, in the kitchen. I just... had to check something in the lab." Tony's eyebrow remained raised. Bruce sighed and added, "I had to dispose of some biohazardous material."

Eyebrows still raised, Tony said, "Biohazardous material? _What_ were you cooking? You know we can just order food, right? Just pick up the phone and food shows up? I know you like cooking and all, but you don't have to, you know, reinvent the arc reactor just to get a bite."

"Right. No. I just cut myself. A tiny bit. And I didn't want to give anyone gamma poisoning."

Tony rolled his eyes. "Gamma poisoning, pfft. I've had worse."

"Uncanny. That is almost exactly what Pepper said."

"Pep's a genius. And so am I, for that matter, so you should definitely listen to us. And we should definitely order pizza so you'll stop cutting yourself."

"PIzza sounds good," Bruce said, knowing better than to protest that it had been an accident.

Tony slung an arm around Bruce and began propelling him toward the kitchen. "JARVIS, order our usual from the usual place, but get something with vegetables on it for Bruce, okay? Bruce? What disgusting unnatural things do you like on your pizza?"

"Um... green peppers? No, mushrooms," Bruce said, thinking back to the wasted peppers from his failed cooking attempt earlier.

"See? Horrible," Tony said. "JARVIS, tell them to make sure the mushrooms don't touch the normal person pizza."

"I will be certain to instruct the chef accordingly, Master Stark."

"Excellent," Tony said as they reached the threshold of the kitchen. "Pepper. Can you believe Bruce likes mushrooms on his pizza? Disgusting."

"I like mushrooms," Pepper said.

"Ugh! I'm living with freaks," Tony said.

"Total freaks," Bruce agreed.


	5. The Art of the Possible

The call came in one afternoon while Tony was hanging around in Bruce’s lab, distracting Bruce because he was bored and providing Bruce with witty commentary on his work was fun (for Tony, at least). But before Bruce even needed to start his controlled breathing thing, his phone rang and then, looking suitably guilty, he rushed away, leaving Tony alone to sulk.

He knew it was only a matter of time, that Avenging wouldn’t be put on hold until he was back in fighting shape, but that didn’t make it suck any less. Tony went back to his workshop (making a quick detour to the liquor cabinet on the way), poured himself a drink, and picked up where he’d left off earlier, scrutinizing Dummy’s error log, trying to figure out why he was still shorting out. He’d been at it for a few minutes when JARVIS interrupted him.

“Sir, Agent Barton of SHIELD is downstairs.”

“Barton?” Tony said, sitting up straight. “Huh. Send him up.” The elevator door opened a moment later and Clint Barton stepped into Tony’s workshop, looking up at the elevator ceiling as he exited.

“Damn, I thought Nat was bullshitting about your AI.”

“Nope, JARVIS really is that awesome,” Tony said, standing up and walking toward Clint. “I thought you’d be out Avenging with the rest of them.”

“Still benched,” Clint said, shoving his hands deep into his pockets and avoiding Tony’s eyes.

“Still? Cap said you were--”

“I was,” Clint snapped. “I was finally doing better. And then Fury…”

“Coulson,” Tony said softly, suddenly understanding.

“Coulson,” Clint agreed. His voice was still harsh but it softened as he spoke. “That was...I didn’t take the news very well. Sorry Stark, didn’t mean to--”

“No,” Tony cut Clint off. “If that was me I would’ve killed Fury, literally. That was a dick move.” Tony’s jaw clenched at the memory; the only reason he hadn’t hauled off and punched Fury was because Fury hadn’t been there. He'd sent Natasha to inform Tony and Pepper that Phil Coulson was alive and even in his anger Tony had enough sense not to punch Natasha; not only was she terrifying but he could tell from her barely-concealed disgust that she was even more livid than he was.

“Yeah, it was,” Clint said. “And, yeah...it set me back.”

“That’s rough,” Tony said. He offered Clint a seat near his desk, then rolled his own chair over and sat down. “Any idea when--”

“After I pass psych,” Clint said. “That’ll get me back on the team, at least. SHIELD...well, doesn’t much matter if I pass psych, there’s still a whole lot of people who don’t want me back. Don’t blame ‘em, really, if I watched someone...well, wouldn’t matter the reason. Can’t work with someone you can’t trust, not in this job.”

“Hey, if they don’t want you back, fuck ‘em. Come work for me,” Tony said, smiling. “I’m serious, Barton, one of the perks of owning a multi-billion dollar company is I can hire whoever the hell I want.”

“Thanks, Stark,” Clint said, looking away. “That’s...yeah, thanks. So how about you, how long’re you out for?”

“Til my doctor clears me, and by doctor I mean Bruce, because my surgeon’s in LA and I hate doctors so it works out that one of the only ones I like lives in my house. Probably at least a couple more weeks. Drink?”

“Thanks,” Clint said, accepting a glass from Tony.

“You still didn’t tell me why you’re here. Don’t get me wrong, glad for the company, but you’re not really the type to just stop by to chat.”

“Nat suggested...I know she’s tired of me moping around whenever she gets called out, I guess she figured we could mope together. So...here I am.”

“Here you are,” Tony agreed. He spun his chair around to the desk and refilled his glass. “Well, since you’re here, how about giving me a hand with something? Nothing major, I’m just not supposed to carry anything heavy.”

“Sure,” Clint said, placing his glass on the floor next to his chair and standing up. Tony led him to the opposite side of the room where a few bulky shipping containers were stacked up.

“Stuff they salvaged from the house. I just wanna move ‘em over there, by the desk, so I can go through them.” Clint nodded and easily picked up the first crate. Tony hung back, watching Clint while feeling awkward and helpless. Clint was halfway through his third trip across the room when Tony started eyeballing the one remaining crate on the floor. It was the smallest of the bunch and looked lighter than the rest. Tony glanced from the crate to Clint, then back to the crate. He picked it up.

“Whoa, Stark, I got that,” Clint said, alarmed.

“Nah, I’m good,” Tony said. Clint looked skeptical but didn’t interfere as Tony half-carried, half-dragged the crate across the room, his heart pounding louder and louder in his ears the whole time.

“Stark, hey, you okay?” Clint said, finally pulling the crate out of Tony’s hands. Tony staggered to the desk and all but collapsed into his chair.

“Fine,” Tony gasped.

“Sir, shall I alert Ms. Potts?”

“I’m fine, J, don’t bother Pep.”

“You don’t sound fine,” Clint said. He leaped aside as Dummy sped over, carrying a water bottle.

“Good boy,” Tony muttered, taking the bottle from Dummy’s claw. Clint stared at Dummy intensely, then grinned when Dummy chirped and clicked at him before returning to his corner.

“So, this happens a lot,” Clint said. It wasn’t a question.

“Only when I overdo it,” Tony said, his breathing almost back to normal. He traded the nearly empty water bottle for the drink he’d left on his desk. “So, yeah, like a couple of times a week. Hey, do me a favor? Don’t mention this to Bruce, I’m pretty sure Hulk almost came out just to yell at me last time he saw.”

“I won’t. But, hey, Stark. Look, I’m the last person anyone should listen to about medical, but I’m pretty sure that’s…not healthy. And maybe if you just take it easy until--”

“Thank you Doctor Barton,” Tony snapped. “You think I haven’t tried? This is me trying, okay. This is the best I can do.”

“Then your best sucks,” Clint replied calmly.

“Barton, you don’t--” Tony cut himself off and took a deep breath before continuing. “Taking it easy, relaxing, it’s not that easy, not for me. I can’t do it. It’s not that I won’t, I _know_ I’m just making things worse, even I’m not that much of an idiot, it’s that I can’t. I’m physically incapable of _not_ doing, Barton, I cannot just do nothing. Believe whatever you want but that’s the truth.”

“I believe you,” Clint said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you sit still, and, hey, you ever read Nat’s full assessment of you? Yeah, it was harsh, but even she said - twice - that you work harder than anyone she’s ever known. Stark, I believe you, but...try harder? You’re only human, you know.”

“Yeah,” Tony said quietly. “I...sometimes I don’t think I know that. I forget. Because Iron Man--”

“Maybe I don’t have a fancy robot suit but you don’t have to explain it, I know. Come on, look at our team. Super Soldier, Hulk…”

“Actual god.”

“Even Nat, she won’t ever talk about what they did to her but she’s...more. Not as much as Rogers but the same idea, she’s a lot stronger than she looks. She’s...better, you know?”

“And then there’s us.”

“Yeah, us. I spend so much time with Nat it’s easy to forget I can’t do what she does. Which is usually how I end up getting hurt.”

“When I’m in the suit, I’m not _invincible_ ," Tony said. "I still get pretty banged up sometimes, but I do shit that should kill me and I do it without a scratch. And now, yeah, I don’t have any suits, but even at home I forget I’ve got to play by a different set of rules than they...than Bruce does.”

“And Pepper?” Clint said, smirking at Tony’s surprise. “Come on Stark, you didn’t think you could hide that from SHIELD?”

“And Pepper, yeah,” Tony said, ignoring Clint’s second question because yeah, he had kind of assumed that. “Between her and Bruce...I guess I wasn’t thinking about the recovery, how long I’d be out of commission.”

“It sucks.”

“Yeah, it does.” They each sipped their drinks and, as several minutes passed, the silence between them grew more and more awkward.

“I heard you destroyed all your suits,” Clint said finally.

“Blew ‘em all up.”

“Why?”

“Pepper,” Tony said softly. “She didn’t ask me to but she...I was in pretty bad shape, after New York. I couldn’t sleep, I was having these anxiety attacks, it was bad. All I did was make suits, a lot of suits. 35 suits in six months.”

“Damn,” Clint whistled.

“Yeah. I was a mess. Iron Man was the most important thing in my world when it should’ve been Pepper. And she hated all of it, even before...she was watching on TV, you know. I called her when I was...when I had the nuke and she missed the call because she was busy watching her boyfriend kill himself on live television. She deserves better than that, you know? I love her but Iron Man came first, always. I built all those suits to protect us, to protect _her_ but they just made everything even worse. So I blew ‘em up.”

“No suits, no arc reactor…” Clint said. “Sounds like you’re done with Iron Man.”

“I’m still Iron Man,” Tony snapped, spinning around to face Clint. “I know what it sounds like but it’s not, it’s just a break. I’ll be back.”

“You better,” Clint said. “How else am I supposed to get on top of all those buildings? Stairs?”

“Thor,” Tony said simply. “But lucky for you I will be back. Me and Pep made a deal, no Iron Man for six months. After that, well, as long as my goddamn heart is all healed up, I’ll be right back out there with the rest of you.”

“What about Pepper?” Clint said carefully. “Joining the team? Now that she’s--”

“No,” Tony said immediately. “She’d never do it, she hates all the violence. Just because she’s got Extremis, that doesn’t make her a fighter.”

“She doesn’t have to be,” Clint said. “Nat’ll train her up quick, if she wants. But there’s more to being a hero than fighting, you know. There’s other ways to help people.”

“Like what?” 

“Like saving people. Getting them out of the way. She’s strong, she’s smart, she’d be perfect. Whenever there’s civilians involved she can help them, she can get through fire or a collapsed building and get people out of the way, get them somewhere safe. She can rescue them.”

“Rescue…” Tony murmured, considering the idea. It was a good one, he’d give Clint that (if it was even Clint’s idea in the first place, and not something he got from Fury), and he had to agree the idea of it might appeal to Pepper. Still...selfishly, Tony wanted to keep Pepper as far away from this life as he possibly could. Yes, he’d done a shit job of that so far, but the idea of Pepper rushing _into_ danger, even with Extremis, wasn’t something Tony wanted to consider.

“Just think about it,” Clint shrugged. “At least run it by her.”

Tony grunted in lieu of an actual reply and turned his attention back to his drink. Clint shrugged, poured himself another drink and, after a moment of hesitation, offered the bottle to Tony. He grabbed it and refilled his glass. For a few minutes they sat and drank in silence.

“Hey, Legolas, talk to me about arrows,” Tony said suddenly, spinning his chair around. He mimed shooting an arrow at Clint.

“Terrible form, Stark,” Clint laughed, shooting his own imaginary arrow at Tony. “What about arrows?”

“I’ve been messing around with some ideas for you, badass new arrowheads, even made a couple of prototypes, but, as you just saw, archery isn’t my thing - possibly because I recognize which century we live in - so if you want to take a look at them sometime?”

“What’s that about prototypes, Tony? Because in case you forgot you’re not supposed to be working right now.” Pepper was standing just inside the doorway with her arms crossed, glaring at Tony.

“Relax, Pep,” Tony said. “They’re tiny, just arrowheads. I make ‘em sitting right here and nothing on Vogel’s list of forbidden fun things is involved, I promise.” Pepper’s lips were still pursed but she relaxed her posture in a way that suggested she wasn’t actually angry.

“JARVIS?” Pepper asked for confirmation.

“Sir is correct, the amount of energy exerted in the production of arrowheads is well within acceptable limits.”

“Ha!”

“However, I cannot say as much for many of the other projects Sir has been entertaining himself with.”

“Whose side are you on anyway, J?”

“The side interested in preventing the heart attack you seem determined to give yourself, sir.”

Tony sulked, Pepper glared, and Clint let out a snorting laugh. Tony made a face, then spun his chair around to face Pepper.

“Oh, hey, Pepper? Hawkeye. Hawkeye, Pepper Potts.”

“It’s Clint, right?” Pepper asked as she shook Clint’s hand.

“Yes ma’am,” Clint said. “Pleasure to meet you.”

“Pleasure’s mine,” Pepper said. “Cut it out, Tony.”

“Ma’am?” Tony said, cackling with laughter. “The fuck was that, Barton?”

“Manners, Tony,” Pepper said. “Some people still have manners.”

“Yeah, well some people aren’t geniuses and billionaires, both of which negate any need for manners,” Tony scoffed. “Anyway, what’s up, Pep?”

“I was starting to be concerned for your welfare,” Pepper deadpanned. “You haven’t been able to harass Bruce for over an hour, yet, somehow, I haven’t received a single filthy sext even though you _knew_ I was in a really boring meeting.”

“I apologize for the lack of incredibly sexy text messages in your life today, but I’ve been too busy shooting the shit with Katniss here. Bros before hoes, you know.”

“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind the next time I meet any hoes,” Pepper said, rolling her eyes. “Are you drunk?”

“Possibly.”

“My fault,” Clint said immediately. “I didn’t mean to--”

“Clint, it’s fine. Tony doesn’t need any help getting drunk, trust me. It’s nice that he has company for a change.”

“Robots are company. JARVIS is company!”

“Human company,” Pepper corrected. “Have you heard from Bruce at all?”

“No, and I’d be pretty impressed if I had,” Tony said. “Since I still haven’t figured out how to Hulk-proof a Bluetooth. Even if they’re done, Bruce can barely remember his own name when he de-Hulks, calling home isn’t really a top priority.”

“I haven’t heard from Nat, either,” Clint said, pulling his phone out of his pocket to confirm. “Nope. But I did miss a text from Coulson.”

“How is Phil?” Pepper asked. “Is he up for visitors yet?”

“Not officially, but me or Nat can sneak you in,” Clint said, not looking up as his fingers flew across the phone keyboard, presumably replying to Coulson.

“That would be great,” Pepper said. “As long as it’s okay with him. I don’t want you to go through the trouble if he doesn’t want me to come.”

“No, he’ll love it,” Clint said. He put his phone back in his pocket. “He’s been asking Nat about you, both of you, actually. The Mandarin thing really shook him up.”

“Do I have to worry about Coulson stealing my girlfriend?” Tony asked, earning yet another eye roll from Pepper.

“You’re safe, Stark,” Clint said. “After New York, SHIELD told Coulson’s girlfriend he was dead and Fury’s not gonna hear the end of it until he figures out how Coulson can get back in touch without compromising a bunch of super classified SHIELD crap.”

“The cellist?” Tony asked, remembering the last conversation he had with Coulson before he “died.”

“Yeah, her name’s Susan,” Clint said, shrugging. “Anyway, Stark, it’s been fun, but duty calls. Ms. Potts, again, a pleasure.”

“Pepper,” Pepper corrected, smiling.

“Hey, I thought you were still benched?” Tony asked.

“I am,” Clint said. “Officially I’m on indefinite leave from SHIELD, but once in awhile someone’ll throw me a bone, give me something to do.”

“Isn’t Phil also on medical leave?” Pepper asked. “I’d assume, after all he’s been through…”

“Yeah,” Clint said, grinning. “Him too. But you know how Fury is about rules, don’t you, Stark?”

Promising to stop by when he had a chance to try out Tony’s arrowheads, Clint disappeared into the elevator, leaving Tony and Pepper in the center of the room, Tony spinning in his chair and Pepper standing nearby.

“Clint seems nice,” Pepper said.

“Clint’s an asshole,” Tony said, wheeling himself backwards to the desk and reaching for the bottle. “But the good kind. Like me.”

“Tony,” Pepper scolded lightly, shaking her head and, when Tony ignored her, taking the bottle out of his hands. “Enough. I didn’t know you two were such good friends.”

“We’re not,” Tony said, watching Pepper put the bottle on the ground, against the wall. “We just...we’re both off the team and it sucks and this beats being pissed off and alone when your best friend gets to go play superhero and you’re stuck at home.”

“You miss it, don’t you?” Pepper said after a moment.

“Miss what?” Tony realized that his hand was absentmindedly tracing a circle over the center of his chest. He wondered how long it had taken him to notice.

“Iron Man. The Avengers.”

“I...yeah. I do,” Tony exhaled. Of course she hadn’t meant...missing the giant electromagnet shoved in his chest cavity would be _insane_. “Of course I miss it. That was my life.”

“I don’t,” Pepper said softly, looking away. “I don’t miss never knowing if you’d come back alive. I don’t miss watching you throw yourself around like you were invincible.”

“I know you don’t,” Tony sighed. “But that’s not what it’s about, Pep. You know it’s not. It’s about doing what’s right, it’s about _making_ things right, making up for the past. Iron Man can’t erase the Merchant of Death but it’s the only thing I can do.”

“You can do the right thing without killing yourself, Tony. You don’t have to make up for the past with your life,” Pepper said, sharply. “You’re not...you’re not Captain America, you can’t just walk away from everything without a scratch.”

“Thank you, Pepper,” Tony snapped, rage flooding his mind. “For the reminder that I am not, and never will be, Captain America. I forgot, you know, it’s easy to forget, it’s not like I spent my entire childhood in the shadow of Steve fucking Rogers, perfect specimen of humanity, thank you for reminding me yet again. No, stop, I don’t care what you meant, okay? Because you don’t get it, I don’t know how much clearer I can be, that Iron Man isn’t about fighting, that’s not the point, Iron Man is my penance, it’s my fucking atonement for my entire goddamn life, and you wouldn’t understand, Pepper, because you don’t know what it’s like. Lucky you, Pep, that you can just live, you don’t have a legacy to salvage, you don’t have a debt you’ll never repay, and I’m happy for you, Jesus, Pepper, I’m truly happy for you because you don’t deserve any of that, you’re _good_ , you’ve always been good, and I hope that never changes for you. But you don’t get it, you’ll never get it, you’ll always come back to the fighting and the injuries and how many times I’ve almost died and that’s _not_ what’s important here. I love you, Pep, but I _am_ Iron Man and until you understand that I need you to stay out of it.”

“Jesus, Tony,” Pepper said, eyes flaring and hands glowing. “Are you listening to yourself? No, you’re not, I know you’re not because you’re drunk, but if you were listening to the bullshit flying out of your mouth you’d realize how completely idiotic you sound right now. I shouldn’t have compared you to Steve, I’m sorry, it was a low blow and I honestly didn’t mean anything by it. But Tony, do you really think I’ve stood by you all these years, supported you through every single thing you were up against as Tony Stark _and_ Iron Man, without realizing why you were doing it all? I know why you do it, I know what you’re trying to prove, and, Tony, I know that you’re wrong. The stakes don’t have to be so high. You can make peace with your past without getting yourself killed and I wish you would just believe that.”

“Pepper, I…” Tony started, then closed his eyes to collect his thoughts. Pepper didn’t get it, no matter what she said, she didn’t understand. If she did she’d never try to get him to give it up, she’d know that he couldn’t give it up, couldn’t as much as he couldn’t make his heart heal any faster. They’d been having this argument for years, since the start, and every time it came out the same. “Look, Pepper, I’m not trying to...it’s been hard for me, you know, being stuck in here all the time and I can’t make this go any faster. I can’t do a goddamn thing about it, do you know how difficult that is for me? I’m helpless and I’m fragile and, Pepper, it’s weighing on me and having this argument? Again? Not helping.”

“Tony…” Pepper started, then stopped and cleared her throat, or at least pretended she was clearing her throat because it sounded more like a muffled sob to Tony. “I know you’re going through a rough patch right now and I wish there was anything I could do to help you, but there’s not. You need to help yourself this time. Nobody can do it for you, not me or Bruce or Rhodey or anyone. Tony, you’re only human. You’ve always been, even with that thing inside your chest, and you have to stop pretending you’re invincible, Iron Man or not.”

Tony grunted and spun his chair around so his back was to Pepper. He hated that some part of him knew she was right.

"Tony…” Pepper said, laying her gentle hand on his shoulder. “I should get back to work. Are you okay if I leave you here?”

“Yeah,” Tony grunted, with a slight shrug.

“You’re sure?”

“I’m fine, Pepper, go.”

“Okay. You’ll tell me when Bruce gets in? I thought we could go out, if he’s back in time.”

“Yeah,” Tony nodded. “Yeah, that sounds great.”

Tony watched Pepper leave, then sighed to himself, retrieved the bottle, and refilled his glass. Turning to his computer, he pulled up a few news websites, wondering if whatever the Avengers were up to made the news yet. He didn’t see anything so, in the interest of passing time until he found something to do or until Bruce came back, he pulled up YouTube and soon found himself watching a string of adorable puppy videos.

After a few minutes he realized his glass was empty again, so he reached over the desk to grab the bottle for another refill. He sneezed while pouring and wound up spilling more than a splash of whiskey down the front of his shirt. Cursing, he tried to wipe himself off but it was hopeless and he ended up peeling off his shirt and spitefully tossing it across the room.

Tony tried to go back to the puppy videos but he couldn’t stop looking down at his chest. It was a mess, old scars from Yinsen’s improvised operation crossed with the new incisions from his surgery, which were still healing. The biggest scar, of course, was right in the center of his chest, where the reactor and its casing had once been. The skin around that scar was sunken and uneven - Yinsen had needed to remove part of his sternum to get at the shrapnel and now, without the reactor in its place, he was left with an ugly empty space.

Tony gently traced the old scars with his finger, then lightly poked at the new incisions. He never realized how much of his chest was scar tissue and he suddenly felt exposed, naked and vulnerable without his shirt. Thinking back, Tony realized that, since the surgery, he hadn’t really looked at his chest beyond checking the incisions for signs of infection.

Surveying the scarred skin, Tony tried to focus his breathing like Bruce taught him, because he could feel the anxiety building, waiting for him to let it take over, and the conscious, controlled breathing made him realize how different he felt, how much lighter and easier it was to breathe without the reactor. The pain was gone too, his lungs and diaphragm weren’t competing for space with a huge chunk of metal anymore. Tony was living without constant pain for the first time in years; he’d gotten used to it, managed to ignore it almost completely, and now, without it, he felt empty. He was missing something and he wondered if that might not have been the source of all the aimless energy he’d been struggling to contain since the surgery.

The incisions were still weeks away from being completely healed, a realization that made Tony’s stomach drop because he didn’t know how much longer he could live like this.

Maybe it was the booze, or maybe he had actually gone insane from boredom, but as Tony sat at his desk examining his chest he suddenly remembered, with perfect clarity, Killian’s minions snapping back from whatever Tony threw at them, regenerating before his eyes. He remembered the test footage, limbs regrown in an instant, and he remembered all the way back to Maya Hansen’s lab, again and again trying to make plants regrow their leaves without bursting into flame.

The fire was the problem, right from the start; eliminate the combustibility and you’ve got Extremis as it was meant to be. You’ve got invincibility, the kind of endurance no suit of armor could hope to provide.

Tony was steps ahead of himself, already digging through the folders of data he and Bruce had collected while working on Pepper before he even realized he’d asked JARVIS to open them. They’d already isolated the elements of Extremis, they already figured out where Killian had gone wrong. Maya said it herself, Tony had almost cracked it thirteen years ago while he was incredibly drunk. Today, older, wiser, and… less drunk, he should be able to figure it out in no time. And then…

“Slow down, Stark,” Tony said to himself. “First you need to figure it out. JARVIS, hey, copy all this to a secret drive for me?”

“Of course, sir. Anything else?”

“Yeah, let me know when Bruce gets back, okay? Or if Pepper’s heading down here again?”

“Certainly.”


	6. At the End of the Day (There's Another Day Dawning)

Once Bruce got over the shock of seeing Tony looking pale and drawn and without a glowing chest piece, he made up a list of rules for Tony. It had been Pepper's idea. "He probably won't follow them, but it's important to set boundaries. And goals. Start small. Probably no more than five rules. Maybe three," she'd said, her forehead crinkling. Bruce thought it was funny that Pepper wanted to protect Bruce from Tony. It seemed obvious that the problem would be the other way around.

Bruce's rules for Tony were:  
1) Mandatory quiet time between 2am-8am (meaning Tony was not allowed to come wake Bruce up to share any brilliant insights he may have had in his sleep)  
2) No forcing Bruce to socialize with other people  
3) If Bruce says he needs to be alone Tony has to listen

Tony had said, "If you're going to be that way, I'll make rules too!" Tony's rules for Bruce were:  
1) No running away without talking to us first  
2) No being lame  
3) Seriously no running away 

Bruce was surprised by Tony's repeated rules. He knew he had misjudged how hurt Tony had apparently been when Bruce left the first time, after the Chitauri attack. At the time, he'd assumed Tony's invitation for Bruce to stay had been based on pity, that Tony had known Bruce had nowhere else to go. Bruce had thought it would be for the best if he left without any awkward goodbyes. Now he knew better--or at least he knew what Tony's preference would be. After all the kindness Tony had showed Bruce, Bruce thought he owed it to Tony to respect his rules.

And despite Pepper's warning, Tony had so far been pretty good about following Bruce's rules. The only one that had really come into play was rule #1, and Tony generally acknowledged Bruce's need for a few hours of sleep (though the first time Bruce shut down his computer and went to bed at 2am, Tony had weakly tried to protest that this violated Tony's rule #2, regarding being lame).

Things had subtly changed since Bruce had returned. It took Bruce a while to figure out what it was. 

Tony had been the only person Bruce knew who wasn't afraid of him, or of the Other Guy. But now that wasn't true. Bruce could tell it from Tony's mannerisms, how he was occasionally shy around him, how he, well, how he wasn't as much of an asshole as he used to be. How he let Bruce go to sleep at 2am instead of making up pretenses for why they needed to run an experiment _right now_ rather than waiting for the next morning.

Tony had lost the arc reactor, and thus, the thing that connected him to Bruce--that they'd both had their bodies changed against their will, that they'd both had to suffer for what made them Avengers. Now Tony's body was healed, and Bruce's was… not. 

Bruce knew he should be happy for Tony. And he knew Tony was right to be nervous, that it was safer for him not to be constantly testing Bruce's control, but he couldn't help but feel a pang. The thought invaded his mind unbidden one night while he lay awake during his self-imposed quiet time. If they could fix Tony and Pepper, why couldn't they fix Bruce? Then… then things could go back to the way they were before, maybe. Then Tony wouldn't be afraid of him. And Betty… or would it be too late? It was probably too late to seek out Betty, after the wreck he'd made of her life. At least Tony and Pepper's lives had been chaotic before Bruce had entered the picture.

Bruce got out of bed and ran through a calming yoga flow. He knew Tony would make fun of him for it, but it honestly helped. 

Why was Tony ruining his quiet time when he wasn't even there? 

Bruce went back to bed, but he slept uneasily. When he awoke the next morning, he asked JARVIS to copy all the data they had about Extremis to a private drive. He wasn't sure if JARVIS could actually keep things secret from Tony, but he thought maybe Tony wouldn't even think to snoop. Then he pulled up all the data about himself and started analyzing. If Extremis could cure… well, just about anything, why couldn't it cure Bruce?

He looked at the time. It was a little after nine, and he suspected Tony might come down to the lab soon. (He could ask JARVIS if Tony was awake, but it felt weird to ask Tony's robot butler to spy on him to help Bruce keep a secret. It was different when he had JARVIS look on Tony when he was actually worried about his health. At least, that was how Bruce saw it.) So he closed down his work station but asked JARVIS to keep crunching the numbers in the background. Maybe eventually the AI would find some kind of statistically useful information. In the meantime, Bruce went down to the kitchen to make some tea.

Pepper was in the kitchen, as she often was at this hour. Unlike Tony, Pepper usually had meetings first thing in the morning. She smiled warmly and said, "Bruce! I was hoping you'd turn up to make me coffee. It's better when you make it."

Bruce smiled back and said, "I am a doctor, you know."

"So your coffee is prescription strength?"

"Shh--I could lose my license if word gets out about this," Bruce said. Technically, of course, his license to practice medicine in the USA had expired years ago. Needy clinics abroad tended to look the other way about that fact. He carefully filled the French press and let it brew for a few moments before pouring Pepper a mugful. Then he made himself a cup of tea.

"I'm so glad you came back, Bruce. Not just for the coffee," she said. Then she took a long sip and added, "But the coffee is seriously great."

Bruce shrugged. "Glad you like it."

Pepper wrapped her elegant fingers around the mug and said, "So, what are you working on?"

"I was thinking about making oatmeal?"

"I meant in the lab. Tony's not making suits, is he? He promised."

"Not as far as I can tell," Bruce said. "Unless he does it while I'm asleep."

"Well, I think he came in around 5 or 6 this morning, I'm not sure, but I'm hoping he'll get another few hours of sleep. So if you have any secret projects, you can probably get in a few hours on them."

Deadpan, Bruce said, "Great, I'll make a lot of progress on my robot tofu press."

Pepper laughed. "Sounds great. Wait, are you really making that?"

"No."

"Hmm. Too bad. See if you can can steer Tony toward some kind of consumer electronics? It would be great if I could take a prototype of something marketable to the board in the next few months."

"What did you have in mind?"

"I don't know, that's your job!" It was expressly _not_ Bruce's job. Bruce was unemployed. "Hey, maybe you guys can design some kind of new coffee pot. Better coffee through science. Or something."

"This coffee is so good because you buy really nice coffee beans."

"Oh. Can you clone coffee beans? Is that possible?"

"Um… I'll see what we can do."

Pepper flashed a brilliant smile at him and put her now empty mug in the dishwasher. "Thanks, Bruce. Have fun doing mad science today, okay?"

"Will do," he said, listening to the clack of her heels leaving. Then he made another pot of coffee and poured it in a fancy insulated bottle Tony had made. He wondered if Pepper knew about it. It kept coffee hotter longer than any Thermos Bruce had ever used. Maybe SI could patent it? He made a mental note to ask Pepper about it later. Then he took his bottle of coffee down to the lab and set it at Tony's work area. (Tony's work area encompassed a ridiculously large area of space, but Tony had a near-mystical ability to hone in on coffee.)

Bruce checked on the status of the Extremis calculations--no useful conclusions, yet--and then pulled up a model of a molecule of caffeine. Maybe he could come up with something useful there. He heard Tony wander in a few hours later.

"Morning, sunshine," Bruce said.

Tony screwed the lid off his coffee and took a deep swig. "God. Bruce. You're the best."

"Based on feedback from you and Pepper, I was thinking about picking up a part time job as a barista."

Tony said, "That's expressly forbidden under the terms of your contract with Stark Industries."

"I never signed a contract."

"You didn't? Really? Hmm. Well, I'll have to change that."

Bruce rolled his eyes. "I doubt I could even get hired at Starbucks."

Tony snorted. "They'd hire you for eye candy alone."

"Um… I don't…"

And rather than seize on Bruce's obvious discomfort, like the old Tony would have done,Tony just laughed and brought his coffee over to Bruce's work station. "Are you trying to make caffeine… better?" His eyes widened. "Genius."

Bruce shrugged. "Just messing around with it, I don't know. It's just something I was talking about with Pepper this morning."

"Ah! Pepper! She's trying to trick you into designing something marketable."

"It wasn't a trick. Just a suggestion, really."

"Hmm. Well, if that's what it takes to keep you from running off to work at Starbucks, I guess we can work on this coffee project. For now. Strictly until I think of something less boring."

"You don't have to…"

"Nah, I'm on board, as long as I get to be a taste tester. Show me what you've got."

Bruce explained the small progress he'd made. Tony was already messing around with a 3-D model of the caffeine molecule he'd had JARVIS project for him. They spent the rest of the day working together. They were such good lab partners that Bruce could almost forget the strangeness of a Tony who didn't have an arc reactor in his chest; a Tony who was afraid of Bruce just like everyone else was.

Bruce never thought he'd miss the version of Tony Stark who gave him surprise electrical shocks just to see what would happen, but he did. It strengthened his resolve to work on a cure for himself. Maybe it wouldn't be too late to go back to their old, comfortable friendship.


	7. What Doesn't Kill Me Doesn't Kill Me

Bruce was acting weird. Weirder than usual, that was, because Bruce Banner was a pretty weird guy in general, not even counting his verdant tendencies. Bruce was distracted, cagey; it felt like he was withdrawing from Tony, and Tony didn’t ask Bruce about it because, for once, he really didn’t want to be right.

Tony didn’t get it. He was sticking to Bruce’s rules the best he could, letting Bruce have his space, mostly leaving Bruce alone when he wanted to be left alone, even allowing Bruce to adhere to a regular sleep schedule. He was on his best behavior, he was honestly making an effort not to chase Bruce away again, but apparently it wasn’t enough.

Still, Bruce seemed adamant about pretending nothing was wrong and Tony was more than happy to play along, so they carried on with their work and Tony could almost make himself believe everything was okay.

Almost.

“Morning… did you sleep at all or have you be down all night?” It was early, around 8:15 AM, and Bruce, clearly half-asleep, shuffled into his lab carrying 2 insulated bottles of coffee. He seemed entirely unsurprised to find Tony exactly where he’d left him 7 hours earlier.

“My hero,” Tony said, grabbing one of the coffees. Bruce’s timing was fantastic; Tony hadn’t slept in over 48 hours and fresh coffee was exactly what he needed to keep himself focused. “Too busy for sleep, Bruce, you know how it goes, genius doesn’t wait.”

“Sure,” Bruce said. “And the dreams?”

“Can’t dream if you don’t sleep, I thought you were supposed to be a doctor.” Tony kept his tone light, hoping Bruce wouldn’t push the subject. It wasn’t that his lack of sleep was because of the dreams as much as he _couldn’t_ sleep so he eventually just gave up trying which, okay, had a lot to do with the dreams.

“Fine,” Bruce said, shrugging. “I believe you. I’m not even going to ask about your heart because I don’t think I want to know, so show me what you’ve been doing all night?”

Tony quickly showed Bruce his work and before he was done Bruce had his glasses on and was making his own adjustments. Tony sighed silently; he’d worried Bruce was going to kick Tony out of his lab because he wanted space (and possibly also as an attempt to get Tony to go to sleep) but instead Bruce was asking Tony questions about his progress, throwing ideas out for discussion, and basically encouraging Tony to relax and get right back to work, which he did happily.

Despite whatever awkwardness and discomfort Tony had been sensing from Bruce, they still worked together as well as they always had. It was almost enough to convince Tony he’d imagined their entire conflict, which wouldn’t actually be much of a surprise because, as Pepper, Rhodey, Bruce, and JARVIS were always ready to remind him, Tony tended to go a little bit nuts when he’d been awake longer than two days.

“Bruce?” Pepper appeared in the doorway a few hours later.

“What’s up, Pepper?”

“Sorry to interrupt - oh, there you are, Tony, I need you to sign some contracts at one point this week. Bruce, can I kidnap you for a minute?”

“Hey, no stealing my science bro, especially not for sordid, erotic purposes, which I’ll assume is what’s happening here until you prove me wrong.”

“Sure, Pepper,” Bruce said, completely ignoring Tony.

“Unless I’m invited, of course, then by all means kidnap away. You brought handcuffs, right? The good ones, I hope.” Tony winked at Pepper, hoping to get a laugh out of her, but he gave up the joke when she didn’t so much as crack a smile.

“Actually, I’m due for a break anyway,” Bruce continued as though Tony wasn’t there.

“Great,” Pepper said, smiling. “After we’re done we can get lunch.”

“Sounds good,” Bruce said, removing his glasses and tucking them in his shirt pocket. “So what’s going on?”

“Oh, it’s silly really. We’re in the middle of expanding the clean energy outreach program and I know you’ve spend time in some of the regions we’re exploring so I thought I could run some things by you, see if you think they’re anything worth pursuing.” Pepper kept talking but Tony couldn’t listen, not after Bruce pulled off his lab coat and carelessly held it out for Tony to take. Tony immediately froze, tense and staring at the coat. He tried to reason with himself before Bruce realized anything was wrong.

There were only three people who could hand things to Tony: Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy. Anyone else...but Bruce wasn’t anyone else, Bruce was _Bruce_ , of course Bruce was allowed to hand him things. So Tony took Bruce’s lab coat, slowly, stiffly, and Bruce barely acknowledged it. Tony doubted Pepper even noticed.

“Tony?”

“Yeah?” Tony said, snapping back to reality and tossing Bruce’s coat on the nearest stool.

“I’ll text you when we’re done so you can meet us for lunch.” Pepper smiled at him and, weakly, he returned the smile. He glanced at Bruce, who was busying himself by cleaning his glasses with his shirt.

“I’m gonna pass today,” Tony said. “I’m not really...not in a lunch mood.”

“Suit yourself,” Pepper shrugged. “Text one of us if you change your mind.”

“Yeah,” Tony said. “I’m just…”

“Tired?” Bruce suggested. “Because getting some sleep is probably a good idea.”

“Bruce is right,” Pepper chimed in. “Take a nap while we’re gone, okay? I’ll bring something home for you.”

“Thanks,” Tony muttered. He looked around at the shared workspace, then reached over to snatch his coffee from the middle of the table.

“See you later, Tony,” Bruce said on his way out the door. He and Pepper were arm-in-arm and Tony was surprised how the sight of them together like that tied something inside him into knots.

****

Tony didn’t take a nap; he briefly considered trying to take one but decided it would just be a waste of time. Instead he gathered his stuff and retreated to his own workshop, figuring Bruce would welcome an empty, quiet lab when he got back.

Tony had decades of experience in distracting himself from whatever unpleasant thing happened to be on his mind and those years of practice had led him to what he considered the most effective recipe for avoiding bad thoughts: loud music, good liquor, an exciting project he could dive into headfirst, and no interruptions. (Pepper referred to this as Tony’s Pouting Protocol which was why she simply rolled her eyes when she talked JARVIS into letting her deliver Tony’s sandwich.)

Despite appearances, Tony wasn’t fully engaged in the Pouting Protocol because he couldn’t settle on one project to throw himself at. He couldn’t work on a suit, obviously, and he was still too weak from the surgery to do anything big. He kept himself busy writing JARVIS some updated code, but before long he noticed his mind wandering back to Bruce, the rules Tony apparently wasn’t following very well, and that lab coat.

“Hey JARVIS, pull up the secret project. You know the one.”

“You have several secret projects in various states of completion, sir, but I assume in this instance you are referring to your new Extremis project.”

“Don’t call it that,” Tony said as the files appeared in front of him. “It’s not _Extremis_ exactly, it’s just based off it. Call it something else. Call it… call it Project Phoenix.”

“Very subtle, sir.”

“Picky, picky. Fine. Project Fawkes. Oh, or maybe the Fawkes Formula? You pick.”

“Very well. For the sake of alliteration, the Fawkes Formula, which is nearly as subtle as Project Phoenix.”

“Fawkes Formula it is,” Tony announced, clapping his hands together. “And J, when I say this is secret I mean secret, like, just you and me, okay? No Pepper, no Bruce. Secret.”

“Of course, sir. Though I must remind you that, historically, those projects you attempt to hide from Ms. Potts are generally the most ill-advised of all your endeavors.”

“Good thing I didn’t actually ask for your opinion, then,” Tony said. “Hey, Dummy! U! Wake up, sleeping beauties, I’ve got work for you.”

The bots sped over to Tony and he set them to work retrieving supplies and clearing a workspace. Tony poured himself another drink and got to work, still thinking about Bruce - how could he not, this being their data - but not so consumed by the events of the morning.

Tony was impressed at his progress; maybe he was familiar with the material because of his and Bruce’s work or maybe he remembered more from his brief collaboration with Maya Hansen than he’d thought. Either way, he’d produced his first attempt at a modified formula and was ready to start testing after only a few hours. He was readying his experiment for action when JARVIS drew him out of his trance-like focus.

“Sir, Ms. Potts is requesting to enter the lab. I suggest you allow her as I believe she is concerned for your well-being and will not give up until I open the door.”

“Fine,” Tony sighed. “Get rid of all this first, though.” He gestured to the projected data around his workspace. A moment later the data vanished, replaced by a different set of notes Tony realized were the specs for Clint’s arrowheads.

“JARVIS, what--”

“I believe Ms. Potts will find this more acceptable than the Fawkes Formula.”

“Brilliant, you know, it’s almost like you were designed by some kind of genius,” Tony said, quickly shoving the supplies for his experiment aside and dumping the box of arrowhead prototypes all over the table.

“Tony?” He could hear the distinctive clack of Pepper’s shoes as she approached him.

“Hey Pep,” Tony said, turning to face her.

“What are you doing down here? I haven’t heard from you for hours.”

“Working on Hawkeye’s arrows,” he said, gesturing to the table. “Don’t worry, I’m behaving myself. No heavy lifting, blah blah.”

“Okay,” Pepper said speculatively. “Come up for dinner?”

“What time is it?”

“Almost 8, we’re eating late, I know. Bruce only just surfaced himself. We’re having stir fry.”

“Not hungry,” Tony said. It was only half a lie, really; he wasn’t hungry as long as he didn’t think about food.

“Did you eat your lunch, at least?”

“Yeah,” Tony said, which was more than half a lie. “I ate late, though, I was…”

“You finally got some sleep, I hope,” Pepper suggested. Tony nodded. “Good. I’d like you to come eat with us but if you really don’t want to…”

“I’ll be up later, okay? A few more hours of arrows first, though.”

“Okay,” Pepper said, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek. “Work hard.”

“Always do,” Tony responded. He walked back to the table and idly picked up on arrowhead, rolling it between his fingers until JARVIS gave the all-clear. In his haste to cover up his Fawkes Formula work, Tony had flung the empty arrowhead box across the room. Not wanting to waste time looking for it, he simply swept all the arrowheads to the corner of the table and brought his Fawkes Formula supplies back to the middle.

Tony ignored JARVIS’s increasingly forward suggestions that he eat something or at least drink some water instead of continuing to subsist entirely on alcohol and coffee. He ran test after test, each time falling short of his desired result (his desired result being everything not ending up on fire). He grew frustrated and, when he stood up and realized the room was spinning, briefly considered calling it a night. But the spinning slowed down and he kept going, propelled by the images that played over and over in his mind: Pepper emerging from the inferno, back from the dead without a scratch, Cap, Thor, Hulk, and Natasha rebounding easily, back on their feet after hits that left Tony grounded even in the suit, Killian’s hellish soldiers regenerating again and again, mocking Tony as he hopelessly tried to kill them, and, most saliently, the clear picture of his own chest, sutured and scarred and concealing a damaged, fragile heart, healing, every fault vanishing in the warm glow of Extremis.

“Fucking fire,” Tony cursed as Dummy rushed to yet again extinguish the burning plant in front of him. He looked at the formula again, not understanding where he kept going wrong.

“J, what am I missing here? What haven’t I tried yet?”

“Sir, at this point perhaps the best course of action would be to wait until morning. Revisit the formula after a good night’s sleep and a well-balanced meal.”

“For the thousandth time, JARVIS, that’s not happening. Drop it and tell me what I should try next.”

“I’m afraid I cannot enable you to continue to work tonight as I believe doing so will directly endanger your health.”

“Jesus, J, now you sound like Pepper,” Tony groaned, throwing his arms up in frustration. “Whatever, it’s not like I need your help anyway. I can do this on my own.”

“Sir,” JARVIS protested weakly, but Tony ignored him and went back to work. A few minutes of analysis later Tony did, in fact, come across something he hadn’t tried and he quickly made the necessary adjustments without saying a word to JARVIS.

Tony stepped back from the table, arms crossed over his chest, and waited for the plant to absorb the newest strain of the Fawkes Formula. The branches glowed and then returned to their natural brown. Tony watched the plant for what felt like hours (but was more likely only a minute or two), finally bursting into delirious, hysterical laughter.

“See, JARVIS, told you I’d get it! This calls for a drink, yeah, a toast to me for being fucking brilliant and awesome and shit.”

Tony grabbed the closest bottle and, after not locating a glass in his immediate vicinity, took a swig directly from the bottle. He turned back around in time to see Dummy, curiously investigating the lack of fire to extinguish, gently bump against the edge of the table.

It seemed to happen in slow motion, at least from Tony’s perspective. The plant burst into flame, but this fire was different than all the others. This was white-hot angry fire, the kind Tony knew was all but guaranteed to explode. Dummy spun around and happily moved toward the fire, extinguisher at the ready, and Tony was shouting and lunging at the bot before he realized what he was doing.

The fire extinguisher was no match for the explosion. Dummy and Tony were thrown back from the table by the blast, with Tony curled around Dummy’s body. Once again, Dummy saved Tony’s ass, literally this time, by extinguishing Tony’s pants before Tony even realized they were on fire.

“Good boy,” he coughed. He stood up, brushing himself off, and looked around. The smoke stung his eyes so he kept them squinted mostly shut, but he could still see an impressive amount of damage. The fire was still going but the danger of explosion was past and the overhead sprinklers were slowly drowning out the flames.

“Dummy, you okay?” Tony asked. “Hey, U, buddy, where are you? Still in one piece, I hope.” Dummy poked him in the leg while U chirped and whirred on his way over from the other side of the room, completely unharmed.

“JARVIS, you with me?” The AI didn’t respond. “Great, hopefully that just took out your speakers…”

The fire was much smaller now, small enough that Tony could approach it. His experiment was destroyed, bits of plants and what had once been notes scattered everywhere. The table was somehow still standing but it was almost completely cracked down the middle. Tony lay his hand on the surface of the table and immediately drew it back.

“Fuck, that’s hot,” Tony cursed. He heard shouting from the emergency stairs; of course Pepper and Bruce heard the explosion, and the elevators must have stopped working when the fire alarm was activated.

“Great, good luck explaining this one, Stark,” he muttered. The table was swaying from his touch and he lightly tapped its leg with his foot, which was apparently enough to send the whole thing toppling over. The remaining parts of the experiment fell into the flames. Tony shrugged; he’d have to start the whole thing over anyway and it’s not like whatever was left on the table could cause even more damage.

He forgot about the arrowheads. They’d been completely buried by supplies and whatever else he’d tossed out of his way over the course of the evening.

“Oh my God, Tony!”

Tony heard Pepper’s yell but by the time she actually entered the room it was too late for him to get out of the way. The arrowheads, outfitted with a wide variety of explosives, were consumed by the fire; the resulting explosion was much stronger than the first one. Tony started to panic when he heard the ceiling above his head cracking but he had nowhere to go amidst the bits of concrete and metal raining down around him. He crouched down, covered his head, and tried his hardest to fight off a flashback of the last time his house collapsed on top of him.

At least this time he wouldn't have to worry about drowning, too.

The knowledge was little consolation, though, when a huge piece of ceiling hit him directly on the back of the head and sent him sprawling face-first to the floor.

The last thing Tony heard before he blacked out was a familiar roar, and he finally knew he was going to be okay when he felt Hulk grab him, huge hands shielding him from the falling debris, and pull him out of the wreckage to safety.

***

“Tony? Tony?” Bruce’s voice grew clearer as Tony woke up. He smelled smoke and remembered what had happened: he blew up his workshop, the ceiling collapsed, and Hulk rescued him just in time. Tony didn’t know how long ago that had happened, but he must not have been out very long because Hulk was still cradling him protectively.

“Thanks, Big Guy,” Tony said, clearing his throat. Carefully, he blinked his eyes open. “Always knew bringing Bruce home was a good…”

Tony’s voice trailed off. Hulk was obviously still holding him but, when he opened his eyes, he found Bruce standing a few feet away staring at him, wide-eyed and pale, and calling his name.

Tony realized with a start that something was very, very wrong.

“The fuck…” Tony said, looking to Bruce for answers. But Bruce was apparently speechless; all he could do was stand and gape, pointing a shaking finger at something above Tony’s head. Tony’s stomach dropped and he whipped his head around to find out who the fuck had their big green hands wrapped around him.

His eyes threatened to roll back again, he’d snapped his head around much too quickly considering the concussion he was probably nursing, but he managed to stay conscious long enough to get a good, clear look at the owner of the hands in question: enormous and green and angry, but a little smaller than Hulk, more compact, with blue eyes and green freckles and an unmistakable shock of red hair.


	8. I'll Always Be There (As Frightened as You to Help Us Survive)

A small part of Bruce was proud of himself for staying human throughout the whole ordeal. The Other Guy hadn't come out for Tony's accident, and he hadn't come out at the shock of seeing Pepper as… well, as a Hulk. His yoga teacher would be so proud.

But Bruce's pride in his self-control was almost completely overpowered by self loathing for having caused this to happen to Pepper. He'd remembered, of course, even if Pepper hadn't--the night he'd cut himself in the kitchen. She hadn't worn gloves even though he'd _told_ her to. She must have been exposed to his blood.

Bruce was pacing around Tony's master bedroom and explaining this to Tony, who was sitting up in bed with a bandage around his head and Pepper, who was sitting on the couch, occasionally looking down at her now fully human hands wonderingly.

"But didn't you say the last time someone got sick from your blood it happened instantly after exposure?" Pepper asked. "You cut yourself weeks ago. And you threw out all the food."

Bruce shrugged. "It would only take a drop. And… and I don't know why…"

Tony interrupted, "Extremis!"

"Oh. _Oh_ ," Bruce said. "Wow. Yeah."

"Could one of you please explain to the non-scientist?" Pepper asked.

"Well… as you know, the Extremis changed you on a molecular level," Bruce said. "We couldn't completely reverse it."

Tony nodded. "So even though you lost the crazy strength and fire breathing, you still had a little bit of the glowing…"

"... and the healing," Bruce said. "So maybe it kept you from getting immediately sick. But my blood could have interacted with the Extremis, changed it somehow…"

"... and it's just been multiplying in your body, taking its time," Tony said.

"I'm so, so, so sorry Pepper," Bruce said. "I…"

Pepper said, "Bruce, it's not your fault."

"It's absolutely my fault. I should have been more careful, I, I shouldn't even be here…"

"Shut _up_ , Bruce," Pepper said, firmly but not unkindly.

Bruce stopped pacing and sat on the floor, hugging his knees to his chest.

"Jesus, Bruce, come here," Pepper said. "Seriously, come sit by me." Bruce obeyed, and to his surprise found himself wrapped in a hug. "I'm not mad at you, okay?"

"But you should be," Bruce whispered.

"Bruce! Do you even know all the shit that's happened to me since I started working for Tony? Like… a lot of things. I knew what I was getting into."

"But--" Bruce started.

Pepper cut him off and said, "And also, your sadsack martyr act is not actually helpful. Okay? You apologized--"

"About 500 times," Tony interjected.

"--and I accept, and now we need to move on," Pepper said. "Okay?"

"Um. Okay," Bruce said.

"Good. So, the first order of business is, can we figure out what exactly happened to me? And, um… if there are any other side effects," Pepper said with a smile.

"Right. Well. I guess the first thing we need to do is take some blood samples from you, Pepper. We can compare them to mine, and also to your samples we've stored from, um, before."

"Yeah, back when you were super-strong and glowing because of some guy I humilated a decade ago, as opposed to now when you're super-strong and green because of swapping bodily fluids with our roommate," Tony said.

"This isn't _funny_ ," Bruce said.

"No offense, Bruce, but I think I have a better idea of what's funny than you do," Tony said.

"I--fine," Bruce said. "Whatever. Let's just… Pepper, why don't we go to the lab and I can take some blood samples and start working."

Tony went to get off the bed and Pepper and Bruce said, "Tony, no!" in unision.

Tony groaned. "This is terrible. Now I live with two Hulks and I have zero Iron Man suits. I am never going to be allowed to do _anything_ fun."

Bruce rolled his eyes. "It must be so _terrible_ to be a _normal human being_ ," he said. It sounded more bitter than he'd meant it to. He'd meant for it to sound like a joke, but even he knew he'd failed at that.

There was a long silence and then Bruce said, "How about if I go and get a kit and then I can come back and take some blood samples here?"

Pepper looked concerned and her eyes flashed between Bruce and Tony. Finally she said, "That's fine, Bruce."

"Don't forget, you'll have to try the lab on the next level down," Tony said.

"Because Tony exploded the one on this floor," Pepper added helpfully.

"It might be locked but you should have retinal scan access to anything," Tony said.

"Okay. I'll be right back," Bruce said.

"Don't forget about rule #1," Tony called. "And also #3. And #2. All of the rules!"

Bruce let out a weak laugh. "Okay." As he shut the bedroom door behind him, Bruce could hear Tony teasing Pepper about Hulk sex. He couldn't quite understand how Tony and Pepper could be so calm. Didn't they understand how _terrible_ this was?

Bruce breathed in. He calmly reminded himself that the Other Guy wouldn't help Pepper at _all_ right now. Bruce breathed out. The lab downstairs was really fairly similar to the one Tony had blown up. Given that no one but Tony seemed to work up on these levels, Bruce had originally wondered why there were so many R &D labs up on the higher levels of Stark Tower. Now, given how unperturbed Tony was about the destruction of his lab, Bruce wondered how often this had happened before.

Given the similar layout, Bruce was able to locate the supplies he needed pretty quickly, and he returned to the bedroom moments later to find Tony and Pepper cuddling on the bed. He cleared his throat and Tony said, "Cool, let's find out what Pepper's made of now!"

"I think still mostly water. And coffee," Pepper joked.

Bruce put on a pair of gloves and said, "Pepper, can I just do a finger jab?"

"Jab away," she said, offering her hand. Pepper had grown accustomed to offering up samples when Tony and Bruce were working on repairing her body from Extremis.

Bruce carefully collected a few drops of blood on a strip and said, "I can go run this sample in the lab. And then I'm sure JARVIS can share the results with you up here."

"Indeed I can," JARVIS said.

"Well, run the test and then come back up here," Pepper said. "Tony needs his science bro."

"Damn right," Tony said.

"Okay… okay," Bruce said. "I'll be as fast as I can, okay?"

In the lab he started analyzing Pepper's blood and comparing it to her old samples. He also pulled up samples of his blood, as well as the cross-reference he'd had JARVIS calculate between his own blood and the pure Extremis sample. He paced around the lab while JARVIS worked. He could go back up to the bedroom now. JARVIS could work without him. He knew he should go back upstairs but he didn't want to face Pepper and Tony again. How could he, after what he'd done? But as he paced, he remembered Tony and Pepper's words to him. They'd asked him to come back. And, anyway, if he'd gotten Pepper into this, he owed it to her to try to fix it. He could leave after he was confident he'd done all he could for her.

He went back up to Tony's bedroom and saw that JARVIS was already projecting Pepper's samples in the air, along with some other data. Bruce peered at it. It looked familiar.

Sheepishly, Tony said, "So, yeah, I've kind of been doing a little side work on Extremis… I thought it might come in handy now."

Bruce licked his lips and said, "Right. Uh, JARVIS, can you go ahead and bring up my data?"

JARVIS asked, "To be clear, Dr. Banner, you're asking me to display all the data in the file you've encrypted and labeled confidential on your service?"

"Yeah, all of it, go ahead, please."

Tony yelped, "I thought we agreed not to work on Extremis anymore! Were you cheating on me?"

Bruce said, "I wasn't working on Extremis anymore, exactly… I was just playing around. What were _you_ doing?"

Tony was flicking through the projected data. "You were playing around with _your_ DNA!"

Bruce said, "Um… well… I had just thought I would see… if maybe Extremis could be used to… cure my condition. So I thought that might be helpful for Pepper."

"Tony, you never answered Bruce's question," Pepper said. "What were _you_ doing with Extremis?"

Tony shrugged. "Just… playing around."

But Bruce was looking at Tony's data, and he said, "You're making super soldier serum."

"You two are _idiots_ ," Pepper said.

"Actually, we're geniuses," Tony said. "It's been documented."

Bruce pushed his glasses up his nose. "Let's just… let's just do this work."

"What work are you talking about, exactly?" Pepper asked. 

"Um… fixing you," Bruce said.

Tony said, "Oh my God, you would have. If you had figured out a cure, you would have given it to yourself."

"Are you crazy? Of course I would have," Bruce said. "I wouldn't wish this on anybody, not even me."

"I'd be dead if it weren't for you," Tony said quietly. "For the Hulk."

"There are other Avengers," Bruce said. "Let them do it. I'd love to be… normal again."

"Normal sucks," Tony said.

Pepper said, "At this point I just want to know more about what… what I am. I'm not necessarily looking for _more_ changes to my DNA."

Tony, still looking at Bruce's data, said, "You must have been working on this every second that I wasn't around. If it was this important to you, why didn't you ask me for help?"

Bruce shrugged and said, "We agreed to stop working on it."

"Yeah, and you know I'm always such a stickler for the rules. Do you want off the Avengers that bad?" Tony asked, sounding hurt.

"I wasn't really thinking about the Avengers," Bruce admitted.

"Then what?" Tony asked.

Bruce focused on his breathing for a long moment and said, "I'm just tired of people being afraid of me. I just… I wanted…" he paused, not sure how to finish the sentence. Tony and Pepper were waiting for him to finish, so he said, "Friends."

"Bruce! We're your friends, don't you know that?" Pepper asked.

"Bruce doesn't want to be friends with us," Tony said bitterly. "He just doesn't have anywhere else to go."

Bruce blinked. "No, that's not--that's not true. I… I thought…" Suddenly, saying this aloud felt stupid and embarrassing. But he didn't think Tony and Pepper were going to let him leave it unsaid, so he blurted, "Tony, you never told me you were going to remove your arc reactor, and ever since I came back you've been so nervous around me, and I can tell, it's how all normal people act around me. Even _Natasha_ is afraid of me and she's not afraid of _anything_."

He closed his eyes and focused on his breaths for several long beats of silence. It might have been the longest silence he'd ever heard from Tony Stark.

Finally Tony said, "Is that what you think?"

Bruce nodded, and Tony laughed. Bruce clenched his fists. He knew Tony could be kind of a jerk, but he couldn't believe he was actually _laughing_ at Bruce. Tony saw Bruce's expression and said, "No, no, I'm sorry, I'm not laughing at you, no, Bruce, c'mon, but trust me it's kinda funny…" Bruce kept his breathing even and refused to look at Tony.

"Bruce, seriously, listen," Tony said, and his voice sounded kind, if slightly hysterical. "Look, I swear, since you came back--look, after you left the first time, we really missed you, and I thought--I thought maybe if I tried to be nicer to you… maybe you'd stay. If I was scared, it was just of fucking it up. Which I guess I did anyway." He laughed again, and now it sounded more than just slightly hysterical. Bruce was reminded that Tony had recently suffered a head injury.

Pepper said, "He's telling the truth, Bruce. We both wanted you to stay, but we didn't… " She hesitating, choosing her words carefully. "It's not always easy, to be friends with you. But not because we're afraid of you--of the Other Guy. We trust you. You're so careful, Bruce, and you have so much control. Anyway, the Hulk likes Tony. He's very proud of that."

"The Hulk loves me," Tony said, and he did sound weirdly proud.

Pepper said, "It's just… you've put up some walls around yourself. And we know, we understand, that you've had to do that. But you don't have to with us. And we thought maybe with time you'd realize that."

"But… why?" Bruce asked. He'd never really understood it, not since the first moment Tony had introduced himself on the helicarrier.

"Did you seriously just ask why we like you?" Tony asked. Bruce crossed his arms and didn't reply.

"Oh, Bruce," Pepper said, and Bruce looked up because her voice sounded strangled. Her eyes were full of tears. "You're such an idiot," she said.

"You keep saying that word. I don't think it means what you think it means," Tony said. "I do agree that Bruce is emotionally… special. Emotionally challenged. Emotionally differently abled. Whatever thing it is you're supposed to say now."

Pepper sighed. "I think a more important question is why anyone likes _you_ ," she said to Tony, but her tone was light. "Bruce, you're smart, funny, kind, and completely unimpressed by Tony's money. Do you know how rare that is?"

Bruce shrugged, and Tony said, "You're impressed by my robots though, right? Because they're awesome."

Pepper elbowed Tony, and he said, "Ugh, you're seriously going to make me talk about my feelings? Is this kindergarten?"

"You skipped kindergarten," Pepper said.

"Well, it was to avoid this kind of thing," Tony said. But then he sighed and said, "Pepper's right, Bruce. Like usual. I hope you'll stay with us. It's _so_ boring when you're not here."

Pepper cleared her throat and Tony said, "Sorry, but you spend like 15 hours a day in meetings, Pep. Plus Bruce actually likes Mythbusters. Not that you don't have your own assets. I mean you have plenty of assets, trust me, but they're different than Bruce's assets."

Bruce said, "I just don't want anyone to get hurt because of me."

"Okay, sorry, Bruce, but Pepper's right. You are an idiot," Tony said.

Pepper said, "Bruce… it hurts us when you run away from us, or act like you think we're just using you for your DNA or something. It hurts us when you don't trust us. We're your friends. Do you get it?"

"Oh," Bruce said. For some reason both Pepper and Tony found that to be hilarious.

Bruce thought about it and added, "I'm sorry."

"No!" Tony said.

Pepper said, "Bruce, I'm making my own rules for you. Rule #1, no more apologizing."

"S--" Bruce started to say, and Tony and Pepper laughed at him again.

Pepper swiped with her hand and said, "JARVIS, put all this data away for now. I can't deal with this anymore. Let's get breakfast. I'm _starving_."

"But--" Bruce and Tony both started to say.

Pepper shrugged. "Look, I feel fine, I'm obviously not going to die from gamma poisoning or whatever in the next hour. As long as nothing else explodes around here I should be fine."

Bruce said, "I'm usually hungry too, when I. Um. Afterwards."

"Being the Hulk is probably a great workout," Pepper said. "I wonder how many calories you burn that way?"

Tony said, "I think we have some biometric data about it. You can put it in your FitBit."

"I bet it's enough to cancel out pancakes with syrup," Pepper said. "Even if it's not, I'm eating them. Is it breakfast time? What time is it? No, I don't care what time it is, I want pancakes."

JARVIS said, "The time is currently 9:33 am."

"I can make pancakes," Bruce offered.

Pepper said, "No, no, relax, Bruce. There's a diner nearby that delivers for us. JARVIS, will you call the usual diner and order like, a thousand pancakes?"

JARVIS said, "Certainly, ma'am. Anything else?"

"Wait, no, not literally a thousand," Pepper said. "Like… twenty. Twenty pancakes."

"And bacon," Tony said.

"Oh, God, yes, bacon," Pepper said. "Sorry, Bruce."

"It's okay."

"Bruce, what do you want?" Pepper said. "You can have some of my pancakes if you want. I probably shouldn't eat twenty pancakes."

Bruce bit back his inclination to say, "Nothing, I'm fine," and instead said, "Um, hash browns? Please?"

"Yes! Hash browns!" Pepper cheered. "JARVIS, please order all that, and tell them to cook fast."

"Certainly, ma'am," JARVIS said.

Bruce remembered the first time he'd changed back. He'd been starving, lost, naked, and alone. Maybe it didn't have to be like that. He said, "JARVIS, will you order some scrambled eggs too, please?"

"Certainly, Dr. Banner."

"The protein will be good for you," Bruce said.

"Whatever you say, doctor," Pepper replied.

Ten minutes later a delivery girl showed up with several styrofoam boxes of food. She gave no indication of being surprised by her customers, and Bruce wondered if she was their usual delivery girl or if she was just a New Yorker. The three of them ate with plastic utensils, sprawled around Tony's master bedroom, and they were the best pancakes Bruce had ever had.


	9. Nothing Has Altered (Yet Everything's Changed)

Living with two Hulks turned out to be way less exciting than Tony might have imagined. After everyone got over the initial shock, Tony and Bruce set to work looking for a possible cure while Pepper, on another leave of absence from her CEO duties (which prompted a resurgence of the very entertaining pregnancy rumors that had circulated during her post-Extremis leave), made good use of the Hulk room Tony had designed for Bruce right after New York (and Bruce hadn’t once stepped foot in). Unfortunately for Tony, his prediction came true and, between Bruce and Pepper, he wasn’t allowed to do anything even remotely fun until his injuries from the explosion - concussion included - were healed.

On the bright side - not that Tony would ever admit as much to Bruce or Pepper - being stuck on bed rest meant Tony couldn’t overexert himself for more than a week and he had a feeling his heart really appreciated the uninterrupted downtime.

Tony and Bruce spent the first few days after the explosion merging their secret data together. Focusing on work seemed to be the only thing that could calm the spiral of self-flagellation Bruce had fallen into, so Tony made an honest effort to stay on task as much as possible. Every interruption frustrated him, even when the interruption was Pepper.

“Tony? Bruce?” Pepper padded into the master bedroom, barefoot and dressed in workout gear, apparently straight from the Hulk room.

“Hey Pepper,” Bruce said, looking up from his data. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, I just wanted to...family meeting time?” Bruce tensed but relaxed after Pepper sat next to him on the edge of the bed and leaned her head against his.

“Am I in trouble? Because whatever I did, it’s Bruce’s fault, I swear,” Tony said, pulling his legs away from the edge of the bed before Bruce could smack him.

“How’re you guys doing with… this?” Pepper asked, gesturing at their work. “I mean, are you close to finishing?”

“We don’t know,” Tony said before Bruce had a chance to start apologizing. “We’re pretty sure we’re on the right track but so was I before I blew up my workshop. Could be days, could be weeks. Hopefully not longer than that, though.”

“Oh,” Pepper said quietly, biting her lip.

“Pepper, I’m so sorry,” Bruce said, cringing as Pepper sighed and Tony kicked him in the back. “We’re trying to get it done as soon as we can, if there was any way to move faster we’d--”

“Bruce, shush,” Pepper said, cutting Bruce off. “It’s okay. I know you’re working hard, both of you, but...um…would you be mad if I asked you to stop?”

“Stop?” Tony asked. Bruce stared at Pepper and appeared to have stopped breathing almost entirely.

“With the cure. We’ve messed around with my DNA enough and, well, I...I’m okay with this. I’ll keep her. She’s...I kinda like her, I guess.”

“Seriously?” Tony asked. He looked at Bruce and wasn’t at all surprised to find him still staring at Pepper in shock.

“Seriously,” Pepper said with a weak smile.

“Woah, hey, Big Guy, you still with us?” Tony leaned toward the nearly catatonic Bruce and poked his shoulder, startling him back into reality.

“I don’t…” Bruce started. He shook his head and ran his hand back through his hair before continuing. “How can you _like_ it?”

“Her,” Pepper corrected. “I don’t really know how to describe it. Just that she...she’s me, except better. I’ve been practicing in the Hulk room--”

“And I meant to ask, how’s it holding up? You’re the first one to use it, you know. I guess some Hulks aren’t as ungrateful as others.” Tony cleared his throat and elbowed Bruce, but Bruce barely reacted. He was still staring at Pepper.

“It’s fine, Tony,” Pepper said, brushing him off and focusing on Bruce. “Bruce, are you okay?”

“I’m...I don’t understand,” Bruce said, finally looking away from Pepper. “You’re _practicing_? How can you control it so easily? You’ve had it for less than a week. It’s been years and I still can’t…”

“Pep’s _known_ about it for less than a week,” Tony said. “Her Hulk-wakening was actually awhile ago, after the least-sexy exchange of bodily fluids possible between such sexy people, and her exposure was second-hand, filtered through your blood, not straight from the source like yours was. Gamma Lite instead of the real deal. Add Extremis, let it all simmer for a couple of weeks, and voila! Pepper gets a new friend but, unlike you and Hulk, she apparently gets to call the shots for both of them.”

“Bruce, I’m sorry,” Pepper said.

“What are you apologizing for?” Bruce said. He was clearly frustrated. “This is...it’s still a nightmare, Pepper, and it’s my fault, I did this to you. I told you, I’m--”

“Bruce, darling, light of my life,” Tony said, holding up his hand at Bruce. “Shut the fuck up. Nobody cares about your Hulk-sized guilt complex except you, especially not Pepper because, in case you didn’t notice, she’s totally cool with having her very own rage monster.”

“I don’t think she’s technically a rage monster,” Pepper piped in before Bruce could protest. “I wasn’t angry. I mean, of course I was mad that you blew up yet another lab while you were inside it, but when she took over I was just...I was scared, I didn’t know if you were okay, and then the ceiling started falling on you and, well, she knew what to do after that.”

Bruce didn’t say anything, just sat on the edge of the bed staring at nothing and occasionally glancing at Pepper with a strange look on his face.

“So what’s next?” Pepper asked brightly, breaking the awkward silence. “I feel like I need to _do_ something with her but I don’t know what.”

“Don’t look at me,” Bruce said, laughing under his breath. “Unless you want to spend the next half decade or so playing hide and seek with the Army. I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“I’ll pass, thanks,” Pepper said, earning her a smile from Bruce. “I don’t know, it kind of feels like a waste, just keeping her a secret, but I’m not about to issue a press release either. We’ve got to be smart about how we handle this which is why I was thinking...”

“You want to tell SHIELD,” Tony said.

“No,” Bruce’s eyes were wide and serious when he turned around to look at Tony. “Absolutely not. Pepper, I’m serious, keep SHIELD out of this.”

“They’re gonna find out anyway,” Tony pointed out. “They already knew about Extremis. Might as well give them a heads up about the new Hulk in town, stay in their good graces in case we end up needing them.”

“I can’t believe you think this is a good idea,” Bruce said.

“More of an inevitability,” Tony shrugged. “Am I right, Pep?”

“Pepper, trust me, Tony doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but I do. Stay under the radar.”

“Who are you, the Unabomber?” Tony said, leaning in to ruffle Bruce’s hair. “You did what you had to do, Big Guy, but Pepper’s not you. Nobody’s out there trying to track her down.”

“Not yet,” Bruce grumbled. “And I’m not convinced telling SHIELD will keep it that way. You know what they’re capable of, Tony.”

“So does Pepper,” Tony said. “It’s her decision to make, Bruce.”

“I know,” Bruce muttered, running his hand through his hair. He looked directly at Pepper. “Just...don’t rush into this, Pepper. Please. Think about it some more before you make up your mind.”

“It’s…” Pepper started. Bruce and Tony both stared at her. “I appreciate your concern, Bruce, but it’s a little too late. I already told Phil.”

“Of course you did,” Tony said, rolling his eyes.

“Pepper, I--”

“Bruce, it’s okay,” Pepper said. She scooted over until she was next to Tony; with one eyebrow cocked at Bruce, she patted the empty space on her other side. Bruce resisted for a minute, then gave in with a heavy sigh and crawled across the bed to sit by Pepper. She patted his leg and he ducked his head, smiling sheepishly.

“This is still all my fault,” Bruce said plainly.

“Again?” Tony groaned. “I’m gonna kick you out of my bed if you don’t cut that shit out.”

“ _Our_ bed,” Pepper corrected. She leaned her head against Bruce’s shoulder and looked up at his face. “Tony has a point, though. Enough apologizing. That’s one of the rules, remember? This was an accident and, besides, I’m fine. I’m better than fine, actually, and that’s thanks to you.” Bruce looked down at Pepper, then up at Tony, and smiled, mostly to himself.

“This is insane,” Bruce muttered, but he was still smiling.

“It took you this long to realize that?” Tony asked, reaching over Pepper to mess up Bruce’s hair again. “I thought you were supposed to be smart.”

“Tony and insanity tend to go hand in hand,” Pepper said. “I’ve found it’s easiest not to resist.”

“I should probably be offended by that, shouldn’t I?” Tony said. Then he leaned over the edge of the bed, reaching for his tablet that he'd apparently tossed on the floor at some point.

"Jesus, Tony, watch your head," Bruce said. "I swear, you have worse survival instincts than anyone I know. I honestly have no idea how you're still alive."

"Too stubborn to die, I think," Tony said, finally grabbing the tablet and returning to the bed. "Also, when did you perfect that half-concerned-half-pissed-off tone of Pepper's? Is it a Hulk thing?"

"More like a living with Tony Stark thing," Pepper laughed. "What are you doing?" Tony had the tablet in his lap and was pulling holograms up from the screen.

"Wanted to show Bruce something," Tony said. "Actually, you might want to see this too, Pep."

"Is that supposed to be me?" Bruce asked, examining a hologram he'd pulled in front of him. "Why is my head so… lumpy?"

"That's you halfway to Hulk City," Tony explained, spinning the image toward him. "See?"

"How did you… JARVIS," Bruce sighed, answering his own question. "And you made a 3D rendering of my halfway transformed head because..."

"Accessories," Tony said simply. He pulled up another hologram and spun it around so Bruce and Pepper could examine it.

"Accessories," Bruce repeated. "Are you venturing into Hulk fashion design now? Maybe you hit your head harder than I thought."

"No, Bruce, look," Pepper said, pushing a hologram toward him. Bruce stared as a tiny holographic version of himself grew into the Hulk and shrunk right back again. Pepper pointed at the figure as it changed. "The pants!"

"There's a headset in his ear, too," Tony said. "I'm still working on that one, I've got a couple of models over here but nothing close to production yet." He waved his hand at the screens floating to his right.

"How long have you been working on this?" Bruce asked.

"I sketched out a few ideas a really long time ago, right after New York, actually. I only just picked it up again, though, since I've been stuck in bed," Tony shrugged. "Hey, I need _something_ to do whenever you two abandon me for whatever it is you non-invalids do. I've been languishing for so long I can't remember what that's like."

"It's mostly just sex," Pepper said casually, cocking an eyebrow at Tony. Bruce made a noise somewhere between coughing and clearing his throat before grinning.

"Not fair," Tony pouted. "Taking advantage of my condition like that. You couldn’t wait? Not surprising coming from you, Potts, but from _Bruce_? I thought we were bros, Banner."

"That's what you get for collapsing a ceiling on top of your head," Bruce said. "Besides, I haven't cleared you for strenuous activity yet, remember? Sex counts as strenuous, I've told you that at least three times."

" _Fine_ ," Tony sighed loudly. "You two should be flattered, you know, that I'm suffering so deeply over you. _Me_ , whose sexual prowess is the stuff of legend. And out of literally millions of potential partners you two come out on top. I don't think you appreciate what a big deal that is."

"That I come out on top?" Pepper asked. "Not really that big a deal, actually."

"Yeah," Bruce grinned. "It'd have to be _much_ bigger to really impress me." Pepper's laugh was more like a cackle.

"Oh, I've got a long list of people who'd disagree with you there, Bruce," Tony said. He turned to Pepper, who was still laughing. "And Ms. Potts, I've never once heard you complaining."

"Only for the sake of your fragile, microscopic ego, Mr. Stark." Pepper yawned and stretched her arms over her head before ungracefully flopping sideways, resting her head on Bruce's knee and sticking her feet in Tony's lap. Tony scooted closer to Bruce, swatting some holograms out of his way, leaned his head back to look at the ceiling, and quickly lay down, flat on his back. After a beat, he tugged on Bruce's arm until Bruce lay down next to him, angled so his head was almost touching Tony's. Pepper wiggled her way toward them and curled up with her head on Tony's stomach and her feet burrowed under Bruce's back. Idly, Tony played with Bruce's hair and tried to imagine the variety of things he and Pepper had been up to during Tony's convalescence.

"Wait," Tony said. He felt Pepper pick her head up. "Did you guys have Hulk sex? Because you should totally have Hulk sex."

"I'm not sure the Other Guy can even do that."

"Sure he can! He's got a dick, we've all seen it. Why wouldn't he be able to?"

"Well, he's never...at least as far as I know..."

"He's never had the chance, but now he's got his very own sexy lady Hulk to play with."

"Excuse me," Pepper said. "Doesn't the sexy lady Hulk in question have any say in the matter? Because she's not interested in being Hulk's toy. Sorry Bruce."

"You two are boring," Tony groaned. "Bruce, not even for science's sake?"

"Talk to the Other Guy," Bruce said dismissively. Then he sat up straight. "Wait, no, bad idea. Don't talk to the Other Guy, not without a suit. The last thing you need is another head injury, or worse."

"Relax, Greenzo," Tony picked his head up to look at Bruce. "He likes me best, remember? He'd probably thank me for the idea, actually, but I'm pretty sure encouraging Hulk sex falls into some kind of ethical gray area, consent-wise, so I'll leave it up to him. You too, Pep, here's the idea, let her do what she wants with it, especially if she wants to pursue it."

"If I thought it would change your mind even a little bit, I'd point out that, generally, considering the kinds of situations that tend to bring out the Other Guy, sex is probably one of the last things on his mind."

"Not true," Tony said. "Some of the best sex I've ever had was angry sex, right Pep?" Pepper grunted. "Oh! I almost forgot! This might help things a little..." Tony sat up, displacing Pepper's head from his stomach, and grabbed the tablet. He flipped through screens until he found what he was looking for and he pulled it up as a hologram.

"Seriously, Tony?" Pepper said as the hologram spun slowly in front of her.

"I was working on the pants and then I realized you have a whole different...situation." Tony gestured vaguely to Pepper's torso.

"So you made a Hulk-sized bra and panties?"

"Designed," Tony corrected. "Can't make 'em until I get proper measurements, before _and_ after, and that's all on you. And this is just the basic design, once we get that down and working we can get creative. Bruce, what do you think gets Big Green's big green up? Lace? Leather? One of those strappy bondage-type things?"

"There is something seriously wrong with you," Bruce said, shaking his head. "I'd blame the concussion but I know better by now."

"I don't need an answer now, just...think about it. Consult with the green giant, find out what makes him jolly."

"I will not," Bruce said smoothly. "Hey, can I take a look at that headset design again?"

"Sure," Tony said. He slid the half-Hulk-half-Bruce hologram over to Bruce and repositioned himself so he could explain the details. His head found its way into Bruce's lap but he wasn't sure Bruce even noticed because he was absolutely fascinated by Tony's designs. Pepper joined their pile and, while she wasn't as transfixed as Bruce was, she was intrigued by the ideas and had plenty of input for Tony.

By the time JARVIS interrupted their work, Tony, Bruce, and Pepper not only expanded on the pants, the headset, and even the bra and panties, but they also developed new ideas for Hulk-safe accessories and Tony could barely type fast enough to keep up.

"That's not gonna work," Bruce said, pointing at Tony's design. "I guarantee he'll destroy anything around his neck, doesn't matter what it is."

"Okay, well," Tony said, quickly rearranging his design. "How about that? He can't--"

"Ms. Potts,” JARVIS called.

"Oh!" Pepper yelped, sitting up straight. "Is it 2 already?"

"2:12, to be exact."

"I completely lost track of time." Pepper shook her head. "Send her up, please."

"My pleasure, Ms. Potts."

"Her?" Tony asked. "Who's 'her'? Why is 'her' invited into our bedroom, what happened to not being cleared for strenuous activity?" He heard the elevator _ding_ in the hallway and, seconds later, he got his answer.

"Hello Natasha," Pepper said warmly. Natasha smiled as she watched Pepper untangle herself from the pile of blankets and limbs they'd settled into while, hop off the bed, and brush herself off. Clint was hovering behind Natasha and Tony could almost see the pieces coming together in his head until his eyes went wide and he whispered something in Natasha's ear. Natasha shrugged, the tiniest of smiles on her face, and Clint barked a single laugh.

"I hope we're not...interrupting," Clint grinned. He wiggled his eyebrows at Tony but stopped when Natasha slapped him on the thigh.

"You're interrupting the creative process," Tony said as he swept the holograms away. "Back in action, Hawkeye?"

"Back on the team," Clint said. "Still benched at SHIELD."

"Fuck 'em, I'll take the team over SHIELD any day," Tony said. "My offer still stands, you know."

"Yeah, I..." Clint trailed off. "I'll think about it, thanks Stark."

"So, what brings my two favorite assassins to our bedroom this afternoon? We usually don't have guests over until _after_ dark but if that's not your thing I'm willing to be flexible." Natasha rolled her eyes but, instead of explaining, deferred to Pepper.

"Well," Pepper said, looking at Natasha and then perching herself on the edge of the bed close to Tony and Bruce. "I told you I was talking to Phil about my… situation. And about SHIELD."

Tony felt Bruce go tense next to him. He looked at Bruce's hands and saw them clenched into fists; he gently forced Bruce's right hand open and covered it with his own. He drew tiny circles with his thumb on the back of Bruce's hand and thought he felt Bruce relax just a little bit.

"Hey, Bruce, it’s okay," Tony whispered. "We already knew that, remember? Nothing to freak out over now."

"I know," Bruce snapped. "But… fuck, Pepper, how can you trust _SHIELD_ with this? With _anything_?"

"We're right here, you know," Clint said, waving at Bruce.

"Sorry," Bruce muttered. He sighed and slouched and let Tony keep rubbing his hand.

"Bruce," Pepper said gently. She touched his shoulder but pulled her hand away when he tensed. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you."

"So, what, you're joining SHIELD now? Full-time?" Bruce said after clearing his throat.

"No, I'm not working for SHIELD."

"But she's on our radar," Natasha said. "Don't tell me you don't know how important that is, Bruce." Bruce grunted but didn't argue the point.

"And, well..." Pepper trailed off. She shifted uncomfortably on the edge of the bed before finally tucking her feet under her legs and gently touching Bruce's leg with a glowing hand, silently willing him to make eye contact. Once he did, Pepper glanced over her shoulder to look at Natasha. Natasha nodded and smiled. "I talked to Phil and Natasha and… I'd like to join the Avengers. If I'm allowed."

"Are you kidding?" Clint exclaimed. "Fury's wanted you on the team since Extremis, this Hulk thing is just gonna be a bonus."

"Really?" Pepper said, sounding relieved.

"Stark didn't tell you," Clint stated. "Yeah, Fury's gonna freak out. In a good way."

"Tony, you knew?"

"Pep, c'mon, there's no way you would've said yes, not before Hulkette made her big debut."

"That's not the point, Tony," Pepper said. "You didn't tell me because you didn't want me on the team."

"Pepper," Tony groaned, finally letting go of Bruce's hand. "I'm still not in love with the idea, okay, even with your gamma guardian angel. I'm never gonna be okay watching you get hurt."

"Well, now you'll know what it's like," she said stubbornly. "Bruce, what do you think? Is this okay?"

"I..." Bruce muttered, looking at his hands in his lap. "This is still insane and I’m still--"

"Shut up," Tony and Pepper snapped at the same time. Natasha tilted her head in confusion but didn't ask.

"Fine," Bruce sighed. "But, uh, can't change the past and, well, you're trying to make the best of what happened. That's… you're not running away or hiding, not like I did. This is so you don't have to hide and… well, I can't argue with that."

"Thank you, Bruce," Pepper said, hugging him. He was smiling when they pulled apart, which made Tony a little less resistant to the whole thing. Pepper leaned in to give Tony a peck on the cheek and then got off the bed again. Bruce still looked slightly dazed so Tony slid toward him so Bruce could lean against him if he wanted to.

"Pepper, are you coming with us?" Natasha asked. "Phil just texted me that Fury's there and I think we'd better tell him before he finds out from anyone else."

"Can I see Phil too?" Pepper grinned when Natasha nodded.

"Are you guys coming?" Pepper asked Bruce and Tony.

"It's gonna be _amazing_ ," Clint said. "Just think about Fury's face when Pepper marches in there, you guys don't want to miss it."

"I..." Tony started to agree when he remembered Bruce, who had been silent since he gave Pepper his blessing. Bruce's head was resting on Tony's shoulder and Tony instinctively ran his hand back through Bruce's hair. "Bruce?"

"No," Bruce mumbled, shaking his head. "You go, you want to."

"We'll pass," Tony said, earning a scowl from Clint and a look of concern from Pepper. Tony waved them off. "Fury might love Pep but he hates me and I don't want my presence to spoil Barton's day, I'm almost disturbed by how happy you look right now, dude, and I'm not gonna be the one to ruin that. Don't want that on my conscience."

"You're a goddamn martyr, Stark," Clint said, rolling his eyes as Tony blew him a kiss. "I'll try to record it."

"You send that video to me the second you leave the room, understood?" Tony ordered, staring straight at Clint.

"Aye aye," Clint said. He saluted.

"Clint, are you coming or are you joining Stark and Banner's chemistry club?" Natasha said from the hallway. Pepper was already out of sight.

"Oh, fuck that," Clint said, hurrying to the door. He looked over his shoulder. "No offense."

"None taken," Tony said. "Don't forget. Video, me, immediately. No excuses." Clint nodded briskly before disappearing down the hall behind Pepper and Natasha. Tony waited until he heard the elevator leave before he spoke again.

"You okay?"

"I… yeah, I guess." Bruce shrugged and sat up straight, pulling away from Tony. "I just can't stop thinking about how this is all my--"

"I'm going to get you a shock collar," Tony interrupted. "And I'm going to push the button every time I hear you fucking apologize for this. I'm serious, I'll do it."

"I'd probably be dead within an hour," Bruce said, laughing. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to--"

"Did you just apologize for apologizing?"

"I… oh shit, I did."

"I don't know what I'm going to do with you, Bruce Banner," Tony said, shaking his head and laughing. "Well, that's not entirely true. I can think of a few things I'd like to do with you..."

"Strenuous activity," Bruce said, lightly tapping Tony's head. "I haven't cleared you yet."

"Isn't that some kind of ethical conflict of interest? Like, how am I supposed to expect you to do your job objectively when you're also directly benefitting on a personal level?"

"Should've thought about that when you refused to see any doctor except me," Bruce said.

"Touche, Dr. Banner," Tony said. “Hey, just curious, where does watching you make us something delicious for lunch fall on the strenuous activity scale?”

“Very subtle,” Bruce said, rolling his eyes. He stretched and got out of bed. “But I’ll allow it. What do you want?”

“Food,” Tony said, pulling himself to his feet. “Nothing disgusting, though, none of your fake meat bullshit.”

“And so grateful, too,” Bruce laughed. Tony followed him out of the room and down to the kitchen where he sat perched on the counter next to the stove. He watched Bruce cook until his phone started beeping and, with a burst of laughter, Tony had JARVIS project Clint’s video, covering the wall with Nick Fury’s gigantic face expressing a range of emotions that made Coulson's Captain America crush look downright somber. 

Even Bruce admitted he would have loved to be there.

****

“Tony?”

“Yeah?” Tony looked up from his work to find Pepper lingering in the doorway. At his acknowledgment, she came into the room.

“You know how you always say I don’t understand why you do it? Iron Man, I mean.”

“Yeah…” Tony said. He put his tablet aside and waited for Pepper to continue.

“You were right,” Pepper said. “I thought I understood but I didn't, not really. But...well, I think I might now. That’s why I’m doing this, joining the team, because I don’t think I have much of a choice now that I know what she...what we’re capable of. It’s like…”

“An obligation. More than that, even.” Tony shook his head. “When we first met, I told Bruce we each had a terrible privilege and it was our responsibility to decide what we did with it.”

“A terrible privilege…” Pepper mused.

“You didn’t choose this any more than Bruce did, or than I chose the reactor. But you’re stuck with it,” Tony said. “Why not make it mean something?”

Pepper was silent for a long moment, deep in thought. Tony liked watching her think.

“When you got the reactor removed…” Pepper started. Tony tensed but kept quiet. “Oh. _Oh._ _That’s_ why Bruce was so upset.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t really...I didn’t think about that part,” Tony confessed.

“And the suits…”

“Pep, I wasn’t happy that you wanted me to choose between you and Iron Man but you come first, always. I’d blow up a thousand more suits for you, I’d…” Tony gulped. “I’d never make another one if it came down to that.”

“You… really?” Pepper looked at Tony in surprise. He nodded. “That’s… before all this happened, hearing you say that would’ve been a relief. But… you’re Iron Man. I can’t change that and… I don’t want to. Not anymore, at least. And I was thinking, well, isn't it pretty hard to be Iron Man without a suit?”

“Pepper…” Tony said, trying to suppress a smile.

“I've been selfish, Tony, because I knew you were hurting without this and I still didn’t back down. I'm sorry. Can we just forget about the six month thing?" Pepper was biting her lip but she relaxed when Tony’s face lit up.

“Yeah? Pepper, you’re the best!” Tony pulled Pepper in for a short kiss.

“No flying yet, though,” she added. “Not until Bruce okays it.”

“Fine,” Tony groaned, but he was still grinning. “JARVIS, you hear that? We’re back in business.”

“You’re not going to make, like, 50 suits at once again, are you? I don't think I want to know how many new designs you've got lined up."

“None,” Tony said. “I did a couple of War Machine upgrades but I haven’t touched Iron Man since Mark 42 back in Malibu.”

“You actually kept your word?”

“I’m insulted by your shock. Hey, once I’m back in action can I come hang out in the Hulk room with Ladyhulk? Maybe one day we’ll even get Bruce in there too.”

“I’ve been trying, but you know how he is,” Pepper said.

“Yeah, stubborn,” Tony said. “Tell him you want to make sure Hulk knows who Hulkarella is before it’s Avenging time. Besides me, the Big Guy isn't exactly open to making new friends."

“That...might actually work,” Pepper realized. “It appeals to the part of him that’s afraid he’ll smash the good guys.”

“That’s _all_ of him,” Tony snorted. “Where is he, anyway? JARVIS, where’s Bruce?”

“Dr. Banner is currently in his laboratory, sir.”

“Ask him if I’m okay to go work downstairs. Tell him I’m making a suit but I’m being a good boy and not trying it out until he clears me.” Tony said. He grabbed his tablet and stood up, kissing Pepper on the cheek again.

“Sir, Dr. Banner will reluctantly permit you to work on a suit pending permission from Ms. Potts. He would also like me to remind you that Dummy is quite fond of him and would be quite easy to persuade to monitor your activities in Dr. Banner’s absence.”

“I’d like to see him try,” Tony scoffed. “Dummy’s my idiot baby, not his. Tell him that, J.” Tony kissed Pepper’s cheek one more time. “Pepper, seriously, thanks for taking pity on my sorry ass, I honestly didn’t know how I was going to make it six more weeks without working on a suit.”

“I’d assume you’d expand your Hulk lingerie line,” Pepper laughed.

“Who says I can’t do both? Measurements, Potts, and a sexy stretchy bra and panties are all yours,” Tony said as he walked toward the elevator. “I’ll be downstairs for the foreseeable future, you know where to find me. Thanks again, Pep, you’re an angel. An honest-to-god gamma-infused angel.”

Tony could hardly wait until the elevator started moving to let out a celebratory whoop. He finally felt like himself again, knowing that he was going to make a brand new Iron Man suit and, hopefully, be able to use it in the very near future. Once Bruce cleared him - and it wouldn't be very long at all, the concussion was already healed and Bruce suspected Tony's heart wasn't far behind - Iron Man would finally be back in action.

He'd be back but not the same, not after everything the three of them had been through since Christmas. Tony realized he didn't have to protect Pepper anymore; he never did, not really, but now watching her in action (as Pepper _and_ as her Hulk) filled him with pride instead of anxiety. Tony also realized he didn't have to worry about Bruce leaving again, not like before. What had once been a very real fear of Tony's all but disappeared entirely when he realized that, finally, Bruce had found people he could call family and a place he could call home. 

Even that apparently wasn't enough to get Bruce to use the Hulk room, though.


	10. Everybody's Got the Right to Be Happy

Bruce had considered it a point of pride that he'd never needed to use the Hulk room Tony had so carefully designed for him. He was in control of the Other Guy. He didn't need to let the Other Guy out, except when the Avengers needed him. He didn't _want_ to. 

But his opinion about it did begin to shift once he saw Pepper in action. She trained with her Hulk. It seemed to Bruce that she and her Hulk worked together as a team. Bruce and his Other Guy felt more like antagonists. Bruce never wanted to give the Other Guy any control, and maybe the Other Guy resented that. Of course, Pepper's genes were different. Pepper was different. 

Still, if practicing with the Other Guy would make the Hulk a better Avenger, maybe it was time for Bruce to give it a try. He'd been officially persuaded to stick around, to stay with the Avengers--to stay with Tony and Pepper--for as long as he could. For as long as they'd have him, he thought. Then he redirected himself. Tony and Pepper had made it very clear that they wanted him to stick around. That they cared about him. That they loved him. 

Bruce needed to stop waiting for the other shoe to drop, which was of course easier said than done. He tried to embrace his present reality as best he could, which was that he (or rather, his alter ego) was a member of the Avengers. He was Tony Stark's lab mate. He was, somehow, the third party to Tony and Pepper's open relationship. This was the most surprising thing. Not that Tony and Pepper would sleep with other people--but that they would choose him. But they had chosen him, and had made it very clear to him one night shortly after Pepper's first transformation.

After the way things had ended with Betty, Bruce had just assumed that he would be alone forever. When he'd confessed that to Tony and Pepper, they'd both gasped and Bruce knew they pitied him. But Bruce had never thought that being alone for the rest of his life was the worst possible outcome. The worst would be if he--if the Other Guy--were responsible for Betty's death, or for Tony's, or for Pepper's. 

But Bruce was beginning to see that there were new possibilities, and he was thankful for them.

And when the call from SHIELD came, he, Tony, and Pepper all went off together, to protect the citizens of Iowa City from some young grad student had somehow developed the power to cause small earthquakes. Bruce felt lucky to be able to help with the abilities he'd accidentally given himself, and lucky to have such companions alongside him. 

They'd managed to neutralize the earthquake-causing grad student, and she was being transported to a secure location by SHIELD. It wasn't clear yet if she was the victim of an experiment gone wrong, a late manifesting mutant, or something else entirely. After Bruce recharged and cleaned up, he assumed he'd join the team to investigate and hopefully help her.

For now, though, he needed to sit here and eat with his teammates, at a Mexican restaurant that was still standing downtown. Bruce remembered the first time he'd eaten shawarma with his teammates. It was after the second time he'd become the Other Guy _on purpose_ , and the first time people had been happy to see him immediately after he'd transformed back. He'd been in better physical condition than anyone else on the team, since the Other Guy had taken all the hits for him. But he'd been starving and disoriented and was happy to stuff his face in near silence with the rest of them. Now a post-mission meal was a necessary tradition. They needed calories and regrouping time before an official SHIELD debrief.

They hadn't needed the whole team for this, and anyway, Natasha and Steve were out on undisclosed SHIELD business, and Thor was back in Asgard for the moment. They'd done fine without them.

Bruce had ordered a burrito advertised to be as large as his head, and was fighting with Tony for the insufficient bowl of chips and salsa.

"Here you go! And these are on the house, by the way," their waitress said cheerfully, handing them each a giant margarita, served in a glass with a cactus for a handle.

"Much appreciated," Tony said.

The waitress' eyes shone. "Thank you all so much. I don't know what we would have done without you all. We don't get a lot of… this kind of thing in Iowa."

"More than you might think," Clint mumbled.

The waitress paused when she handed a glass to Pepper. "You're, um. You're the She-Hulk, aren't you, ma'am?"

Pepper groaned. "Is that what they're calling me? The _She-Hulk_?"

"Oh! Sorry, ma'am, that's just what I heard on the news," the waitress said, backing away a step.

Pepper gave a quick smile. "No, no, it's fine, I'm sure you didn't make it up. It's just… ugh, She-Hulk?"

Tony said, "We'll do some press, spread a new name."

"What would you like to be called?" the waitress asked.

"Oh, I don't know," Pepper said. "I hadn't really thought about it."

"Well, anyway, thank you," the waitress said. "You were great, you pulled so many people out of… well, out of where the Chem building used to be. Um, my girlfriend is a chem TA. She said you rescued her. Thank you for that."

Pepper smiled. "Happy to do it," she said. "That's what I'm here for, search and rescue."

"She's a lover, not a fighter," Tony said.

"She's a rescuer," Bruce corrected.

"Maybe your name can be Rescue Girl or something like that," the waitress said.

"I'll think about it, thanks," Pepper said, though Bruce was pretty sure Pepper wouldn't choose any name with "girl" in it if she could help it. "What's your name?"

The waitress looked down at her shirt reflexively. "Oh, I guess I forgot to put my name tag on when I came back from my break… it's been kind of a mess around here. I'm Veronica."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Veronica," Pepper said, extending her slim, human hand.

Veronica beamed and blushed for a moment, then stammered, "Anyway, your food will be right up. Um, let me get you some more chips, though."

After the waitress left, Tony raised his margarita and said, "Cheers to Rescue!"

Clint, Pepper, and Bruce raised their glasses and said, "Cheers!"

Pepper said, "Rescue? Did you just name me like one of your robots?"

Tony said, "It's to the point. Rescue, it's what you do."

Pepper sighed. "I guess I like it more than She-Hulk, anyway. I'll do a press release when we get back to New York."

"You should make sure to do your merchandising agreements soon too," Clint said. "Trust me, otherwise you're gonna end up with tons of weird stuff out there with your face on it."

Tony said, "Yeah, and only I get to make weird stuff with your face on it!"

"Gross," Pepper muttered. Bruce passed her the nearly empty basket of chips and she happily devoured them.

Veronica came back with more chips and salsa. "I brought you some salsa verde," she told Pepper. "Because, you know… green."

"Oh! Um, thank you," Pepper said graciously.

"No problem! Anyway, your burritos will be right up."

"Ooh, salsa verde," Tony said, reaching for it.

"Nope, it's mine," Pepper said. "You heard her. Bruce, you can have some if you want."

"No fair!" Tony pouted.

"When you can turn green, then you can have some too," Pepper said.

"You probably shouldn't give him any ideas," Bruce said.

Clint shrugged. "I don't know. The more Hulks, the merrier, I always say."

"I was actually just thinking of painting my next suit green. You know, in solidarity," Tony said. "Plus it's good branding, since the suit runs on green energy and all."

"Next suit?" Pepper asked, her eyebrow raised.

"I just have some ideas," Tony said, but was cut off by the arrival of enormous burritos.

"Wow, these _are_ as big as my head," Pepper said.

"Oh yes, we're famous for them," Veronica said. "Um… would it be okay if I took a picture of you guys? We could hang it up on the wall?"

By now, Bruce was used to this kind of request. Tony beamed and said, "Absolutely," and Pepper and Clint nodded their assent.

"Cool, thanks!" Veronica said, pulling an iPhone out of her pocket. "Smile!" Then she passed the phone to Tony and said, "Um, would it be okay if you took one of just me and, um, what should I call you?" she asked Pepper.

"We're going with Rescue," Pepper said. "And sure." She stood and put an arm around Veronica, who was clearly starstruck.

Tony took the picture and said, "You can take one with me if you want."

"Oh, no thanks, I'm good," Veronica said. "Enjoy your burritos! Let me know if there's anything else I can get you." She walked away, and Bruce could see she was already uploading the picture of her with Pepper to Facebook.

"Looks like you've got yourself a fanclub," Clint said, clearly enjoying Tony's dismissal.

But Tony recovered and said, "Of course she does. But everybody better remember that I'm the Pepper Potts fan club president. I'm the founding member."

"Of course you are, honey," Pepper said. She rolled her eyes, but turned to give Tony a brief kiss.

Tony beamed. He lifted his burrito high and said, "Welcome to the Avengers Initiative, Rescue."

Bruce and Clint lifted their burritos too, and Pepper smiled. "Thank you, thank you. I'd just like to say that without Tony and Bruce there would be no Rescue, and even though they are both huge idiots, I can't imagine life without them."

"Great speech," Clint said.

"Thank you," Pepper replied, around a mouthful of burrito.

Bruce took a bite of his own burrito. It was delicious. Bruce couldn't say for sure if it was due to the salsa verde or just to the company it was eating with, but he resolved to just enjoy the moment. If this was what his new normal was, he could get used to it. And if another shoe were to drop--well, Bruce knew some people with some pretty big feet.

**Author's Note:**

> Because we're nerds, the story's title and all chapter titles are from different musicals.
> 
> "Something Next to Normal" is from, um, _Next to Normal_
> 
> 1.) "Everything's Alright (Yes, Everything's Fine)" is from _Jesus Christ Superstar_  
>  2.) "I've Got a Singular Impression Things Are Moving Too Fast " is from _The Last 5 Years_  
>  3.) "Everything's Easier When You're Home" is from _In The Heights_  
>  4.) "Why Does it Take an Accident (Before the Truth Gets Through to Us)" is from _tick, tick.... BOOM!_  
>  5.) "The Art of the Possible" is from _Evita_  
>  6.) "At the End of the Day (There's Another Day Dawning)" is from _Les Miserables_  
>  7.) "What Doesn't Kill Me Doesn't Kill Me" is from _Next to Normal_  
>  8.) "I'll Always Be There (As Frightened as You to Help Us Survive)" is from _Company_  
>  9.) "Nothing Has Altered (Yet Everything's Changed)" is from _Chess_  
>  10.) "Everybody's Got the Right to Be Happy" is from _Assassins_
> 
> If you now have any of these songs in your head, we're not sorry.


End file.
